


Japan's Unknown Materials Program (J.U.M.P.)

by thanku4urlove



Category: Hey! Say! JUMP, Johnny's Entertainment
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe - Marvel Cinematic Universe Fusion, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, M/M, Originally Posted on LiveJournal, Past Character Death, Science Fiction, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-11-07 14:54:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 33,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20819165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thanku4urlove/pseuds/thanku4urlove
Summary: When an encounter with an alien artifact leaves four dead, one unconscious, and another barely in control, Yabu's team of agents are shaken up by a visit from an old acquaintance.





	1. Japan's Unknown Material's Program

**Author's Note:**

> Written for my sister's birthday back in 2016! This is a Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. AU! I don't think you really need to have seen the show to read the fic, though some references might be confusing.

“How is he?”

Inoo shrugged, looking down at his tablet. “The same as he was thirty minutes ago, the last time you came to see him.” He answered. “We’ve been trying to run blood and tissue tests for a good hour now, but there are so many unknown elements that the systems aren’t sure how to process them. For Yamada and Keito both.”

Yabu frowned, taking his eyes from the tablet Inoo was holding, the screen covered in infographics he only half understood, back to Yamada’s heart monitor. Thankfully, that at least was steady. His face was scraped up, he had a nasty gash on his shoulder, and there were bruises littering his torso, but at least his heartbeat and breathing rate had stabilized.

“How long does this medically induced coma have to last? He’s been out for nearly two days now.”

“You saw what happened the last time he came to consciousness.” Inoo reminded him, a light frown on his face. “If you want to deal with that again, be my guest.”

“Come on, we can’t keep him under for much longer.” Yabu turned to him, frowning back. “Keito never passed out, and he’s fine.”

“Keito didn’t grab his head and start screaming whenever anyone touched him. He just nearly punched a dude into outer space.” Inoo shot back. “Chinen doesn’t think we should take him off the barbiturate as least until we’re done analyzing the samples.”

“And how long will that be?”

Inoo sighed a little, putting one hand to his side and the other on the control pad for Yamada’s door.

“Fifteen minutes. I still don’t think this is the best idea.”

“We need to talk to him.”

Inoo opened the door with a tap. “Yes sir. I’ll adjust his dose.”

Yabu thanked Inoo and left, letting out a long breath. Nobody on the plane used any honorifics on him unless they were trying to be patronizing. He may have been appointed the acting director of this division after the Inhuman outbreak on May 9th of last year, but none of them really gave or took orders from each other. He was just the one that had to listen to--and occasionally lie to--the higher ups.

“Yabu!” Inoo was dashing down the hallway after him, his face considerably more panicked, his outstretched hand holding what Yabu recognized as his cell phone. “You left your phone in there, and it started ringing, I answered it, and…” He paused to take a breath, Yabu taking the device from his hands. “...I think it’s Hikaru.”

Yabu swallowed thickly, unmuting the call and placing the phone slowly to his ear.

“Hello?”

“Did you get a promotion Kota? I didn’t know people were answering your phone for you now.”

He sounded happy, friendly, genuine, and it made Yabu’s chest ache.

“No, I just left my phone in a different room.”

That made Hikaru laugh.

“Of course you did. Are you tracing this call?”

“Obviously." Yabu told him. "Who do you take me for?”

“That’s cute. Almost as though you don’t know this is a cheap phone I’m planning on breaking in half as soon as I hang up.”

“Sounds like a waste of money.”

“You lose your phone so much, I think we’re probably even.” There was a silence, and in it Hikaru sighed. “Unfortunately Kota, this isn’t just a courtesy call. You have something that I believe belongs best in my hands.”

“It doesn’t belong to anyone.” Yabu shot back. He’d known this was what the call was bound to be about, though he'd hoped against it. “And it isn’t leaving this plane. It’s too dangerous.”

“You think everything is dangerous.”

“Hikaru--” Yabu turned away from Inoo, who was watching him intently. “That thing killed the four men that were handling it, and incapacitated two of my agents. We’re keeping it here.”

“Then I’ll have to come and collect.”

The phone clicked, Yabu sliding the device into his pocked, turning back to Inoo.

“Please tell me you were able to trace the call.”

“Yeah, about that…” Inoo tapped at his tablet, turning it to Yabu. “That phone was moving the entire time. Like… Moving fast. I think he’s in some kind of aircraft. I graphed a trajectory, and it looks like he was tracing us too, because he’s heading in this direction.”

“How far out?”

“An hour, roughly.”

“...great.”

“Hey!” Came a shout from a few rooms down. “Get back in here!”

“That yell is for me.” Inoo said, his body already turned in the direction of the lab. “The samples are probably done. Want to come?”

Yabu nodded, the two of them making their way to the plane’s mobile laboratory. It was more or less in a constant state of disorganized mess, but Yabu had enough faith in Inoo and Chinen to know they had a handle on what they were doing.

“You know these tablets have a messaging system on them, right?” Inoo asked as he walked in. “So you didn’t need to shout at the top of your lungs?”

“I left mine over on that table over there. Couldn’t be bothered to get up.” Chinen waved dismissively, Yabu indeed seeing the device on a tabletop about six feet away. “And hey, this worked just as well.”

“What did you find?”

“Honestly, I’m not sure.” Chinen said, standing. He didn’t like not understanding things, masked frustration on his face as he pulled up a few different holographic diagrams. While Yabu wasn’t any kind of genetics expert, he knew what he was looking at wasn’t quite right. “This is going to sound extreme, but it’s almost as if all of the strands were scrambled and put back together. And there are several extra ones now, some pieces of DNA that weren’t there before, integrated into Yamada and Keito’s bodies. Things that definitely aren’t supposed to be there. It’s unlike… Well, anything else we've seen, really.”

“Touching that thing,” Yabu pointed to the faintly glowing blue crystal that was sitting in a glass box a table away, “reconstructed their DNA makeup? Added extra?”

“I don’t think the stone added DNA to their system.” Chinen said slowly, as though he was thinking and speaking at the same time. “It was probably there already, but I think touching the crystal may have just… I don’t know. Activated it, in some way.”

“That’s… Well.” Inoo was engrossed in the diagrams, looking over the results again. Yabu rubbed his hands together.

“I’ll go tell Keito, I suppose. Yamada should be awake soon; let me know as soon as that happens.”

Chinen nodded, Inoo already beginning a theory as soon as he took a step out the door.

“Come on Keito, hit me.”

“I don’t want to.” Keito answered, shaking his head. Yuto gave him an assuring grin, tapping his chest a few times with his arms before extending them.

“I’ll be fine. I’ve had broken ribs before; I can take it.”

“I don’t think that’s helping.” Daiki remarked dryly.

“Keito can’t hurt me.”

“I think I can.”

“But you won’t.” Yuto met his eyes. “Just a little chest bump.”

Stress was clear on Keito’s face but he nodded, taking a step forward. He swung his fist, Yuto not moving to block it, letting the force hit his torso in full. He was thrown off his feet, his body slamming into Daiki’s and toppling them both to the ground.

“I’m sorry!” Keito ran over to them, looking about ready to cry. Yuto tried to smile at him again, but the wind had been knocked so roughly from his lungs that it was proving difficult.

“I’m fine, I’m…” He took Keito’s hand, the process of getting pulled to his feet nearly making his arm feel like it was going to be ripped off. Keito let him go instantly, Daiki catching the agent and steadying him.

“Sorry.” Keito said again, genuinely close to tears this time. Yuto touched the side of his face.

“No, it’s fine. It’s good; we’re learning. The more stressed you are, the stronger you get. That’s good to know. You ate dinner yesterday without breaking any chopsticks, so you’re not going to destroy everything. We just need to figure this out.”

“How’s it going in here?” Came a call, the three of them looking in the direction of the door. It was Yabu. “Yuto, are you okay?”

Yuto sent him back a thumbs up, straightening.

“We’re doing some strength testing.” He answered.

“Please tell me you’re using the custom dynamometer Inoo constructed and not your own body.” Yabu said, his face suggesting he already knew the answer. Yuto gave him a sheepish grin.

“We have been doing good work in here.” Daiki assured him. “We think that the more stress Keito is under, the harder he hits. Like his inner strength can convert itself into physical strength.”

“If he could find a way to harness that, it could be a real asset.” Yabu remarked.

“I will.” Keito responded instantly. “I’ll control it.”

“Keito, you’re doing fine. You’re doing amazingly, okay?” Yabu put a hand on his shoulder. “Chinen looked into it, and it seems like the crystal activated something unknown in your DNA. Something that was already there before. We’re still trying to figure it out, but I thought you ought to know.”

Keito nodded, looking unsure of what to say.

“That’s amazing!” Yuto beamed at him. “I always knew you were incredible, Keito. Now there’s just proof in your body to show it.”

Keito gave him a small smile back, Daiki shaking his head at both of them.

“I’ll go get that dynamometer. Yuto’s going to have enough bruises tomorrow as it is. Then we'll get back into it, yeah?”

Keito nodded, much more reassured, and Daiki couldn't help a smile.

“How are you feeling?’

Yamada grimaced, slowly opening his eyes. An aura of concern was radiating through the room, so overwhelming he could almost taste it. The feeling made his chest tight, glancing over to see Takaki in the middle of it all, sitting in the chair next to his bed.

“Aren’t… Don’t you have to have to wear a hazmat suit to come in here or something?”

Takaki shrugged. “You know how much stock I put in that alien stuff.”

Yamada shook his head a little, but he couldn’t help the small smile growing on his face. “You really aren’t afraid, I will give you that.”

“Honestly though, how are you? You’ve been out for two days.”

“Seriously?” He sighed, pushing himself up on to his elbows.

“It’s not your fault; you were put under. You needed to rest, and something about stress levels.”

“How’s Keito? He touched the thing too, didn’t he?”

Takaki nodded. “He’s super strong now. It’s like he turned into the Hulk, just… Smaller. Less green.”

Yamada let out a breath, groaning into a sitting position.

“I’m fine.” He told Takaki, feeling the waves of worry and unease increase as he moved. “I’m okay to sit up. I’m not going to freak out, or anything.”

“Sorry.” Takaki said, but Yamada waved him off. “What’s different this time? Because last time when you woke up--”

“I think because it’s just you.” Yamada cut him off, not wanting to be reminded. Honestly he didn’t know for sure, but last time he’d woken nearly everyone was standing around him, all trying to do something, and the collective power of their stress and panic made him feel as though his ribs were about to crack. “I can feel… I can feel what you’re feeling. And since you’re only one person, it’s not as overwhelming and heavy as it was before.”

Takaki nodded in understanding.

“No one else has touched the crystal.” He reported. “You and Keito are lucky you survived; some of the lab workers that were transporting the thing were turned to stone by it. Chinen told me they were completely converted into carbon, so… They’re dead. He’s trying to work out why that didn’t happen to you and Keito too. Some sort of DNA thing.” He waved a hand. “You know how much I pay attention when he rants at me like that. I’m not a scientist.”

“The man we were after was touching the crystal too.” Yamada said. “And our bullets weren’t doing anything to him. He probably has some kind of power, like we do.”

Takaki nodded, and Yamada grinned, shaking his head.

“I still can’t believe you just got on your motorcycle and ran him down.”

“Motorcycles are a little harder to dodge than stun bullets.” Takaki responded with a shrug. “Plus, I had the transportation pod for the object he was holding, so it all worked out. It did scratch up the paint though, and the front wheel is out of alignment. Nothing I can’t fix.”

“Who do you think that guy was?” Yamada asked. “I’d never seen him before, but he was dressed like and fought like an agent. Nobody was supposed to know about that transport mission. Our team didn’t even know what the cargo we were moving was.”

“Well, maybe he was an agent.” Takaki answered. “We don’t know. He did say something about Yabu though, after I hit him. Talked like he knew him; called him Kota. This was all before he dropped that crystal though. Nice catch, by the way. I get the feeling that if it hit the ground, it probably would have killed me.”

Yamada sent him a smile. “All in a day’s work.”

“I’ll go tell Yabu you’re awake. He’ll want to talk to you.”

Thanking him, Yamada watched Takaki leave the room. Who he really wanted to talk to was Keito, but there would be time for that. He just hoped their director would have more answers.

Daiki flicked off autopilot, sliding into the driver’s seat. They were about two hours away from Headquarters, and to him, they couldn't get there fast enough. They had things to talk about, things to adjust for, and decisions to make. Most importantly though, they needed to relax. All of them did.

He glanced down at the controls, minutely adjusting their course and turning autopilot back on. He wanted to go talk to Yamada; Takaki had tucked his head into the training room as he was leaving, searching for Yabu, which probably meant that their fellow agent had woken up.

He looked back up, half out of his seat, falling back in shock. There was a figure attached to the plane’s windshield, unmistakably humanoid, pushing something round against the glass. Two thin, metallic arms extended from the device, cutting a wide circle into the windshield, Daiki unable to do anything but buckle himself in for when the glass fell away.

When it did the wind whipped violently against his skin, but the stranger took no notice to it, stepping in as though nothing was wrong.

“Hello. I’m here for something that’s mine.” He spoke slowly, and loudly, and good thing--Daiki could barely hear him as it was. “And to punch in the face of the man that hit me with his glorified motorbike.”

Then a fist came fast at Daiki’s face, Daiki barely able to raise an arm up before everything slammed painfully into black.

“Yabu. Yabu! Takaki!”

Footsteps came for them fast, the two turning at the shouts. They were on the way to visit Yamada, the news that he was conscious finally coming to Yabu’s ears, but the panic on Yuto’s face put that thought immediately from the director’s mind. Yuto never panicked. He was too strong, and too skilled, to really ever be scared; even in outmanned, outgunned situations, he was optimistic enough to pull through with a smile and some determination.

“What?”

“I think there’s someone--or something--on the plane. I went to ask Daiki if he wanted to visit Yamada with me--he went up to check the jet’s route--and when I got there Daiki was knocked out and there’s a huge hole in the windshield.”

“There’s a what?” Yabu had to ask.

“A hole!” Yuto repeated, voice insistent, as though he didn’t have time to repeat himself. If what he was saying was true, and not as ludicrous as it sounded, then he was right. They didn’t have time to stand in the hallway and gape at each other.

“Who would attack our plane?” Takaki asked, but Yabu could tell the answer wouldn’t matter much; his face was already set for combat. It took a moment, but then Yabu realized who it was. Who it must be.

“Hikaru. He’s here.”

“But ow does it work?” Chinen ran his hands through his hair. Inoo rolled his eyes.

“Honestly, we don’t need to worry about that thing right now. We need to worry about our teammates.”

“If we figure it out, don’t you think that would help? They’re the ones that touched it and turned into… Whatever they are. They didn’t turn into carbon statues, but they transformed. How?”

“By touching it. Now can you close the case please? It's making me nervous.”

“What makes them special?” Chinen was thinking out loud, thinking to himself, Inoo’s request completely disregarded. “I'm guessing it's their DNA, whatever that strain is, but their previous blood samples are the same as--”

“The same as yours?” Inoo walked over, closing door on the glass case. “Leave it, Chinen. That thing kills people, seemingly at random, and as far as I’m concerned, the sooner we get it to HQ and to a professional team of people, the better.”

He walked back to his table, Chinen reaching over and pulling the small door open again.

“We need to figure this out, Inoo. It’s our duty to science.”

“No. The only thing we need to figure out is why they wanted us to transport it from the Australian base, especially in such a roundabout way. I get the feeling they know what it is, so when we get there, we’ll find out. Can you help over here? I’m almost done running the second test on Keito’s blood.”

“Or they don’t know what it is, and they’re afraid of it.”

“As they should be! You’re terrified of bunny rabbits, but an alien crystal thing, and you’re just…” Inoo turned to him, trailing off, his mouth falling open. “What have you done?”

Chinen was standing there, eyes wide, entire body shaking. His left hand was gripping the glowing crystal so tightly that his knuckles were turning white, something black overtaking his body, his skin turning to brittle rock. Inoo had to find Yabu.

“You're one of the two agents that touched the crystal and survived, aren’t you?”

Keito whirled around, jumping back in surprise. There was a hooded man standing in the practice room, walking in too quietly for Keito to have heard. His voice was unfamiliar, and when he let his hood fall back, his face was unknown too.

“I am.” He answered hesitantly. “Who are you?”

“I’m like you. And I want to help.”

The entire situation wasn’t right, something uneasy in Keito’s stomach, but help with this strength--this force he’d injured Yuto with--was an offer he wanted to take more than anything else in the world.

“You understand it? You can help me?”

“We can help each other. My name is Yaotome Hikaru, and I’m here for a few reasons. You and your transformed friend are one of them.”

At the revelation of his name, Hikaru paused. When Keito didn’t react, which was evidently what he expected, he smiled.

“Yabu hasn’t told you about me. That’s probably for the better.”

“Why?” Keito took a step back. “Why are you here? What is it you want?”

“I want the crystal, and I want to take you and your friend with me. We can develop and grow, away from anyone you could hurt.”

“That crystal is dangerous.” Keito countered, stepping back again. He was getting close to the far wall, and Hikaru was continuing to slowly advance. “The only place it’s going is headquarters, to be examined before it can hurt anyone else.”

“I was really hoping we could work together on this, but have it your way.”

He rolled his shoulders a few times, each rotation causing a dark mist to come from his back, floating to an empty space and materializing. Before long, four exact clones of the man were standing there, looking towards their original for instruction. Hikaru gave a simple nod and that was all they needed, two of them running from the room, the other two rushing in Keito’s direction. Keito held his fists up, desperately trying to reign himself in for a fight. This was one he couldn’t lose.

Yamada shifted to the edge of the bed, letting his feet touch the cold marble floor for a moment before straightening up. He felt all sorts of groggy, his limbs heavy, but it had been over fifteen minutes since Takaki had left, and if his director wasn’t coming to him for a status report, he figured it would simply have to find Yabu and give it to him.

Someone was heading down the hallway in fast, focused steps. Yamada closed his eyes, trying to concentrate, his eyes snapping back open when he realized that not only was the person coming his way, but he couldn't read them. He couldn’t feel them. Whoever it was, they’d left their emotions elsewhere.

Then his door opened, and it was a man Yamada had never seen before.

“Come with me.” He said.

“Who are you?”

Then the man swung at him, Yamada blocking his fist with his arm, bringing his leg around to kick the man hard in the shin. He stumbled but didn’t lose his balance, his elbow connecting with the side of Yamada’s face. Ears ringing, Yamada stumbled back, slamming into all sorts of beeping equipment, the stranger grabbing his arm roughly and yanking him towards the door.

Yamada used his free hand to lay punches on his arm and torso but there was no effect, as if they weren’t being felt at all. His legs were too weak to dig into the floor and he could feel himself being dragged to the door, fear settling into his throat.

Then a surge of surprised panic overtook him, but the emotion wasn’t his own; Inoo burst in, a rocket-launcher sized device on his shoulder. He shot it, the synthetic webbing sticking to the man’s skin and fanning out to entrap his entire body, Yamada managing to wrench his arm free before he was encased in the trap as well.

“Who the hell is that?” He asked, trying to get his breath back. Inoo shook his head.

“No idea. But Chinen touched the crystal, and three men that look exactly like that one are in the training room. Keito is holding off two of them, but he won’t last much longer. Agent Yamada, I know you’re not at the top of your game, but we need you.”

Nodding, Yamada followed Inoo out the door.

His entire body felt as though it was buzzing, and maybe it was; the dark rock fell away as though shaken off, tumbling to the floor in chunks. Chinen took a deep breath, looking at the crystal in his hand. Each of his senses were hyperaware to a point where it was almost painful, but the rock had stopped glowing.

The door slid open, the panels so slow that Chinen frowned, wondering if they needed to be repaired. The doors hadn’t been that delayed moments before, when Yabu had exited the lab.

A man walked in, but he too was moving sluggishly. It was nearly comical, the way his eyes met Chinen’s before resting on the crystal, and he started towards it, determination setting gradually on to his face.

It took the door sliding closed for Chinen to realize what was happening. The entire world hadn’t slowed down; he’d sped up, watching the unknown man approach him in half time. The man wasn’t friendly, that much he knew, so he decided to take advantage of the space he was being given. It took three kicks and a punch for the man to fall to the ground, Chinen standing over him, watching as he fell. It was surreal, and he felt the beginnings of panic well in his chest. The edges of his vision blurred as he struggled breathe, the seven-second exhalation pattern doing nothing to calm him. The ground rushed up to meet him much too fast.

“Hikaru!” Yabu shouted. The man turned, a smile growing on his face.

“Kota.”

“Don’t make me do this.” Yabu pulled his gun from his holster, Hikaru immediately bringing his arms to his head. The clones fighting Keito stopped, the agent’s heavy breathing loud in the room. “You need to stop. You need to leave.”

“I need to do what’s best by this man.” Hikaru gestured in Keito’s direction, sweating and slightly bloody. “And the other one, that you stored away on your plane. And I know that solution is for them to come with me.”

Yabu could only shake his head, taking another step in Hikaru’s direction.

“I’m not the one you think is dangerous. It’s him, isn’t it?” Hikaru gestured to Keito, both of the clones lunging at him again. “He’s new. He’s different, and you don’t understand that.”

“No. I’m helping him. I’m letting him work through his powers. He doesn’t want to hurt anyone.”

“Neither did Taiyo.”

Yabu recoiled as though punched, both Takaki and Yuto reaching out to steady him.

“Nobody on your team knows, do they? About our training group? About the accident that caused one of our friends to come in contact with unknown artifacts? He changed, and you killed him.”

“Shoon would still be alive if I’d just followed orders. If I’d shot on sight, like I was told.” Yabu’s arms were steady but his voice wasn’t, swallowing thickly. “He was dangerous.”

"He didn’t know what he was doing. He was scared. He needed help, not the bullet you put in his back.” Hikaru took two strong steps in Yabu’s direction. “And I won’t let you do the same to these two either.”

“I won’t.”

Hikaru just shook his head, lowering his hands, sighing and looking down as though tired of the whole ordeal.

“You won’t shoot me. You’re a wreck already, just seeing me down the barrel of your gun.”

“That’s where you’re wrong.” The gun fired with a bang, Hikaru jolting back. He stumbled, his hands instinctively going to his chest. The clones attacking Keito dissipated instantly, Inoo and Yamada running in.

“Yabu, shit--” Inoo began, Yamada grimacing and bringing his hands to his chest.

“It was a tranquilizer.” Yabu said quickly. “He’s not--”

Then Hikaru’s body dissipated as well, turning to mist and disappearing.

“Another clone.” Yuto breathed. “He must still be in the cockpit.”

They searched the plane, but the intruder wasn’t anywhere to be seen. They roused Daiki as they went, the agent sporting a split eyebrow, the bruise already blossoming out colorfully.

“I managed to tag a tracker to his sleeve, right before he knocked me out.” He reported. “Should we follow him?”

Yabu sighed, letting his head rest against the wall behind him.

“We have three incredibly unstable agents, one of which is still unconscious, and strict orders to bring this crystal directly to headquarters. Of course we’re going to follow him.”


	2. A Wanted Inhuman

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After an attack on their plane Hikaru is on the run, and Yabu is determined to catch him. Meanwhile, the three newly transformed Inhumans on the team struggle with their powers, and Chinen tries to dig up the past.

“Well…” Yabu sighed, turning a minuscule piece of metal in his hand.

“Well?” Inoo asked back, his voice anxious for an answer through the commlink in Yabu’s ear.

“He’s not here.”

Inoo let out a long sigh, one Yabu was mirroring internally as he spoke again.

“I’m guessing he hit the ground running as soon as the tracker stopped, so he could be any number of places by now. He was on some… Some flying type of vehicle. It had to have been flying, at least, to get on the plane. Though I’m not sure how.”

“What do you mean?”

Yabu simply paused, taking a picture of Hikaru’s vehicle and sending it over so Inoo could see. There was an echoing moment of silence before the technician spoke again.

“That’s a skateboard, Yabu.”

“I know. I’ll bring it on the plane with us, so you can break it apart to look for flying capabilities; that’s a feature Takaki’s been wanting to add to his motorcycle for months. Regardless, this is what the tracker was stuck to. Hikaru must have found it and ditched.”

“Okay. Keep us posted.”

Promising he would, Yabu disconnected. He met eyes with Takaki, who shook his head. There was no sign of Hikaru in the immediate area, or any hints at which direction he could have gone. Yabu wasn’t ready to give up yet though, signaling for Daiki, Yuto, and Takaki to gather around him.

“We’re going to fan out. Ask around; we’re looking for our friend. We got drunk last night, and now we can’t find him. Keep it casual.”

He got responding nods, each of them heading in the direction of their choice. Yabu rolled the tracker over again in his hand, shoving it into his pocket. He couldn’t shake the feeling that Hikaru was already gone, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t try.

“What is it like? Mind reading?”

Yamada shook his head. He’d tried to tell them already, but their honest confusion and genuine attempts at understanding made him sympathetic.

“It’s more like… Feelings. I can feel how confused Keito is right now. And now he’s a little embarrassed. But don’t worry; that much I could tell just from your face.”

Keito gave him a small smile, and Yamada smiled back. He, Keito, and Inoo had been told to stay on the plane while the rest of them went after Hikaru, since the tracker had stopped moving. The acting excuse was that Chinen needed people to be there for him when he finally woke up, since they didn’t yet know what the crystal had done to him, but they all knew the real reason was that he and Keito weren’t considered stable enough to go out into the field. Keito had protested a little, but Yamada had felt relieved. Yabu’s call was the right one. Keito just always protested when Yuto went out on missions without him; Yamada didn’t need his powers to know how worried they both got when they weren’t there to cover each other’s backs.

“It makes me feel what anyone around me is feeling. So when there’s more than one person around, or something really emotional is happening, it gets overwhelming. Which is why I acted they way I did the first time I regained consciousness. I’m sorry about that.”

Inoo waved off his apology, leaning closer.

“What am I feeling right now?”

“Curiosity.” Yamada said instantly, unable not to smile. “But you’re attempting to project sadness, which is weird for you. Nice try.”

Inoo laughed, pulling away. “So that whole time earlier when you were reading Keito’s mind, that was a joke?”

“Completely.” He answered with a laugh, feeling the small waves of relief coming from both of the agents to his left. “He just wears his heart on his sleeve. And all over his face.”

“Speaking of which, how are you?” Inoo asked Keito. He got a shrug in response.

“I’m fine, I guess.”

“No you’re not.” Yamada couldn’t help but say. Keito paused for another moment, looking unsure if he wanted to speak, his words coming out in a jumble when he opened his mouth again.

“I hurt Yuto. Badly. He and Daiki were on the ground, and he couldn’t breathe, and--” The pencil he’d had in his hand snapped, and he dropped the pieces of wood to the floor as though they’d burned him. Stress was radiating from his body in pulses, Yamada resisting bringing his hands to his temples. That would only make Keito feel worse.

“Well, you must not have hurt him as badly as you think, because he’s out there right now, running around.” He pointed out instead. “He’s fine.”

“Yeah, but--”

“Besides, won’t this make up for when he tased you on a mission that one time?” Inoo cut in. “Remember? It was an accident, and then we had to do a last-minute fake identity switch to embalmers because nothing woke you up. Your muscles were sore for a week. You have to be even now.”

Keito just shrugged, smiling downwards as though getting zapped so hard he passed out by their fellow teammate was a fond memory. It was, Yamada realized a moment later, holding in a snort of amusement.

“You’ll be able to control it.” He said. “You’ve always conquered that you try hard at. This won’t be any different.”

“Trying hard is part of what triggers it though.” Keito countered, frowning slightly. “What about you, Yamada? Do you think you’ll be able to control what you can do?”

Inoo turned to look at him, and he genuinely didn’t know how to answer.

“I hope so.”

“I’m sorry dude, I don’t make a habit out of looking at people’s teeth. I’d run my tongue over yours though, if you’ll let me.”

Takaki resisted pulling a face, putting another few steps between himself and the man at the bar, who he’d been trying to question. Hikaru’s supposedly crooked teeth were the only defining physical trait Yabu had been able to give, but it wasn’t proving to be the most helpful.

“Slow down there, big boy. I’m looking for a guy with black hair, around my height?”

“Haven’t seen him.” His tone was dismissive, raising his beer bottle to his lips and taking a long drink. “I can make you forget you’d ever seen him, too.”

This was one too many sexual lines Takaki could take for one day, pulling that face he’d been wanting to make since the middle-aged man and his greasy hair had made eye contact with him.

“Slow down there, I’m already committed.”

“To who?”

“Myself.” Turning on his heel, Takaki walked out. He heard Yuto giggle through the commlink in his ear.

“Sounds like all those ‘independent woman’ undercover jobs are finally getting to you.” He remarked. Takaki snorted.

“Shut up. I’ve got nothing. Anybody else have a lead?”

“Nobody has seen a single person that looks like Hikaru.” Daiki reported, Yabu’s sigh in his ear enough of an answer.

“How have no black-haired guys walked through here? Half of the people in this damn place have black hair, but none of them were him.”

“This is more or less what I expected.” Yabu finally spoke up, the resignation in his voice something Takaki hated to hear. “Let’s head back. We’re wasting our time.”

When Chinen opened his eyes, the room was empty. He glanced around, recognizing instantly that he was on one of those glorified gurneys that they kept in the hospital wing, an IV in his arm and a pulse tracker pinching his index finger. He removed them both, sitting up, debating whether or not to call for someone when there was a sound at the door.

“Hey.”

It was Inoo, his arms crossed over the tablet he was holding to his chest. Chinen gave him a small smile, watching his teammate walk into the room. He wasn’t going sluggishly, like Chinen remembered the mysterious man had been after he’d touched the crystal, but Chinen’s memories of that moment were hazy at best.

“Super speed, huh?”

Chinen nodded. “Saw the security footage then?”

“Well, that and you just sat up so fast I thought you might have pulled something.”

That made Chinen laugh.

“I’m not talking quickly though.”

“You’re not breathing quickly either. Probably has something more to do with air movement than anything you have going on.” Inoo took a seat in the chair next to the bed, looking over his face. Chinen let him stare for a moment before asking.

“What?”

“You’re an idiot. You have the highest IQ on this entire plane, but you’re the dumbest person I know.”

Chinen chuckled, looking down at his hands. He knew what this was about.

“Sorry.”

“I can’t believe you touched that thing.”

“Sorry.”

Inoo pulled himself to his feet, and without looking at him, leaned down to pull Chinen’s body in for a surprisingly powerful hug.

“I’m glad you’re not dead. But if you pull a dumbass stunt like that again, I’ll kill you.”

“Love you too, Inoo-chan.”

Inoo rolled his eyes, a small smile on his lips, and with that he was gone. He must have spread the word, because Takaki ran in less than five minutes later, squeezing the air out of him. Yamada and Keito came in soon after, asking him how he was feeling, and he let them know he was fine. The buzzing, vibrating feeling he’d had now faded to a sort of low hum in his chest, increasing a little in volume whenever he moved. It was a good thing to use to gauge his movements; it took about an hour of people coming in and out before he was okayed to finally get out of bed, and the last thing he wanted was to zoom around and scare everyone.

He decided he wanted to run blood work himself, on his own tissue, and while waiting for the results the rest of his teammates filled him in. He’d been asleep for a little over five hours, passed out while they followed the tracker on Hikaru’s vehicle, which turned out to be the dissected skateboard on Inoo’s lab table. The area was empty of who they were looking for by the time they’d gotten there, and now Yabu was running two of the plane’s servers for anyone who looked like Hikaru through the world’s CCTV database for a lead.

“A transporter jet came to take the crystal to HQ.” Yabu finally said when he asked why it was missing, the lab empty but for himself, Yabu, and Inoo. “They weren’t too happy about what happened. I’ve been ordered to keep an eye on the three of you, and report any findings to the higher-ups. There might be a few therapy sessions in your future.”

“I don’t need therapy.”

“I didn’t say you did. But you’re an Inhuman now, and--”

“And Inhumans get put on the index.” Chinen finished, discomfort welling in his stomach.

“Okay, but what’s so wrong about The Flash?” Yuto insisted again, voice louder to be heard over the swell of giggles coming from Yamada and Daiki.

“Because it sounds less like I’m a superhero and more like I’m on the police watchlist for public indecency.” Chinen deadpanned.

“Shut up!” Yuto said, his tone clearly amused. “I don’t know why you’re laughing Daiki, you suggested ‘The Dash’ a second ago. That’s not any better.”

“Okay, but no name is worse than ‘The Feeler’.” Yamada chimed in, another chorus of laughter going around the room.

“What about for Keito?” Takaki asked. “I’ve just been calling him the Hulk, but less green.”

“But he’s not strong all the time.” Chinen countered. “Only when he feels like needs to be.”

“We can’t call him Inner Strength Man.” Daiki said, and amidst the laughs Keito put his head on Yuto’s shoulder.

“Chi Man?” Chinen suggested.

“Chia Man?” Yamada offered right after, Daiki nearly falling off of his chair in laughter.

“All of these ideas are horrible.” Takaki said, Keito just shaking his head. “Might as well just call him Strongy McPunch Punch.”

“Please don’t.” Was all Keito could say, Yuto collapsing into giggles next to him. There wasn’t time for any better suggestions though, Yabu rushing over, face both stressed and serious.

“40.7608 degrees north, 111.8910 degrees west.” He blurted, Daiki nodding and getting to his feet immediately.

“Why?” He asked as he went, Yabu jumping a little to fall in line with him, as though he hadn’t expected such an immediate reaction.

“Hikaru’s face. Inoo caught a screenshot of it at those coordinates.”

“We’re going after him again?” Daiki had hoped they were heading to HQ; Hikaru hadn’t done anything to provoke them a second time, and he obviously didn’t want to be caught. “Why?”

“Partially because I was told to bring him in.” Yabu answered, his tone suggesting he was holding in a sigh. “If he’s an Inhuman, they want to get a good look at him, especially if he’s willing to use his powers to attack agents. Partially because I need to speak to him, face to face. It’s been too long.”

“How long is too long?”

They had reached the control room, coming to a stop in front of the door.

“40.7608 north, 111.8910 west.” Yabu repeated. “Get us there. I need an ETA as soon as you set the course.”

“You got it.”

Whether he was preoccupied or avoiding answering Daiki couldn’t tell, but he wasn’t about to press the director. Daiki knew the unsure, troubled look on Yabu’s face, and being questioned wasn’t going to help anyone. So he just sighed and sat behind the controls, hoping that this time at least, they would manage to get Hikaru on their plane.

“I bet they dated or something. I bet they were in love.”

“No.” Keito countered quickly, shaking his head, Chinen frowning lightly at the opposition. “I don’t think so.”

“But they knew each other though. Like… On a first name basis. Yabu doesn’t even try to catch himself anymore when he calls him ‘Hikaru’.” For a short while, Yabu had tried just calling him “Yaotome”. It hadn’t lasted long.

“But that doesn’t mean they were in love. Yuto and I are on a first name basis.”

“Horrible example.” Yamada said shortly, taking a quick bite of lunch, Chinen giggling while Keito turned pink.

“Oh! Yamada!” Chinen exclaimed, turning excitedly as though it was his first time seeing the agent.

“What?” Yamada asked, taken aback. Inoo shifted in his seat, eyes not leaving his tablet.

“You could tell us! You were there, right?”

Yamada nodded slowly, falling into thought as he tried to remember. He was silent for a good while, Keito and Chinen exchanging glances, even Inoo looking up in wait for the verdict. The technician had fallen strangely silent once Hikaru’s name came up in conversation, but Yamada didn’t seem concerned, so Chinen didn’t feel the need to ask him about it.

“I don’t know.” Yamada finally said, the anticlimactic conclusion causing Keito’s upper body to slump overdramatically. “There was fondness, but whether it was platonic or romantic… It wasn’t something I could tell. I wasn’t in there very long.”

Keito nodded in understanding, Chinen sinking back into thought. Hikaru and Yabu must have known each other for a while; not only did they behave familiarly with each other, but Hikaru had brought up events that none of them--not even Yuto, one of them that had started training the longest ago--confessed knowing anything about. Yabu, of course, had been through training longer than any of the rest of them… Chinen realizing with a jolt that Yabu and Inoo often joked about the amusing coincidence that they had entered training on the same day, meaning Inoo had to have been there when Hikaru was training. He turned quickly in Inoo’s direction, who was tapping at his tablet, seemingly disengaged from conversation and his knees pulled up to his chest.

“What do you think, Inoo?” He knew a more straightforward question, with anything referencing past events or the names Yabu had mentioned during he and Hikaru’s confrontation, would have Inoo chalking up some excuse and leaving the room. “Do you think they liked each other?”

They all looked in Inoo’s direction once the question had been asked. Chinen noticed Yamada’s eyes flicking to him for a split second, wondering if the other agent could feel his apprehension. Inoo’s brain was working slowly, looking past all of them as he thought. The he sighed.

“That’s not it--”

“Guess what?” Takaki’s voice broke into their conversation. The Hikaru manhunting crew was back, and the mechanic’s angry tone was enough of an answer.

“Oh, so you found him then?” Yamada asked, his voice bright with sarcasm. Takaki snorted.

“No sign of him. Again.” Yuto reported, coming behind the couch to rest his elbows on Keito’s shoulders. Daiki walked in, ruffling his hair with more ferocity than usual. Yabu looked particularly defeated.

“But how could he just disappear?” Inoo asked. “We were at his location less than fifteen minutes after we saw him; it’s not as though he can run, or bike, or drive faster than the radius you searched, right?”

“Inoo, you’re asking the people that _didn’t_ find him.” Daiki reminded dryly, Chinen scooting over a little to offer their fellow agent a seat. He smelled like sweat, exhaust, and annoyance, typical of New York City. “We’re just as perplexed as you are.”

“We’ll just have to wait.” Yabu announced with a sigh. “Wait until he messes up again, and track him down.”

Surprisingly, that didn’t take long. They caught the lower half of Hikaru’s face in Cuba, then his side profile through a crowd in Tibet, then a hand Yabu swore was Hikaru’s in an instagram photo taken on Emerald beach in Okinawa. They jumped time zones so often that the time of day simply ceased to matter, eating dinner at 9 a.m., or starting a new training session at midnight. It became exhausting, and began to feel excessive.

“He’s baiting us.” Inoo finally said in frustration. The servers had picked an image of Hikaru up again, and the team had already been dispatched to find him. This time Keito had joined them, Yabu declaring him stable enough to come on a light field mission. The use of the word “light” in reference to the chance of finding Hikaru was telling enough of how the director expected it to turn out.

“What do you mean?” Chinen asked. He and Inoo were alone in the lab, Yamada having left them at dusk to make lunch. Inoo was projecting the mission updated on their smart table, the both of them simply sitting back and watching it.

“Hikaru is supposed to be good.”

“To be fair, he has avoided our team every time.” Chinen pointed out.

“Sure, but he’s leaving a trail behind him. It’s as though he wants us to know where he is, like a trail of breadcrumbs. He’s supposed to be an expert in stealth--he knows better than to wear a t-shirt and simple sunglasses to a store with surveillance cameras.”

Chinen wanted to ask Inoo if Hikaru was some sort of ex-agent--or current agent, for that matter--after the stealth comment, but thought better of it.

“What then, do you think he’s leading us somewhere?”

Inoo snorted in dry amusement. “If he is, we’re bound to not figure it out until before it’s too late. Whatever that’ll come to mean.”

“Hey, Inoo?” The rest of the team were going to be out for at least twenty more minutes, and if Inoo tried to run away from the question, Chinen knew he was faster. “What do you know about Hikaru?”

“We’re going to stop and get some coffee.” Keito said, a snort from Takaki heard over the earpiece.

“High intensity mission.” He remarked, nearly drowned out by Yuto’s enthusiastic request for them to get him something too. Daiki chuckled, promising they would, and Keito pushed the door open.

There was a welcoming jingle and the instant chatter of voices. The place was crowded and warmly lit, contrasting the already-dark windows to outside. Keito and Daiki walked up to the counter to order, Keito holding on to Yuto’s order too as they went to sit down.

“So.” Daiki took a sip through his straw. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m…” Keito paused, trying to collect his thoughts. He was feeling a lot of things, but the predominant feeling was… “Pressured.”

Daiki raised his eyebrows, obviously not having expected that answer.

“It’s not Yabu.” He clarified quickly. Technically it was, a little, but only for putting him on the mission. “It’s just that if he’s here, I can’t mess anything up.”

“Keito, you’re not going to mess up.” Daiki set his cup down and gave him a smile. “Besides… Do you even think we’re going to find him?”

For that, Keito had no answer. He shrugged at Daiki, who laughed lightly back. Then his face dropped instantly, causing Keito to frown.

“What?” His voice softened to a whisper, feeling the need to be quieter. Daiki’s response was equally hushed.

“Don’t look now, but he’s here.”

“What?” Keito asked again, the question echoed by every team member through their earpieces.

“He’s over there, by the window.” Daiki nodded to Keito’s left, his eyes on the table. Keito set his cup down as a precaution before turning, glancing around, meeting eyes with Yaotome Hikaru from across the cafe.

“He used to train with us, at the same facility.” Inoo said slowly, the two of them making their way to the plane hangar. They’d received a partially misspelled message to open the doors. Inoo had asked why, but after fifteen minutes without answer, they’d decided to go ahead and do so without any context. “He and Yabu were close. There was a… Conflict, and he left.”

“Conflict?” Chinen asked. Inoo’s face was blatantly uncomfortable, and he sighed a little.

“I wasn’t in their training group.” He countered finally. “I don’t know what happened.”

That wasn’t exactly true, Chinen could tell by the quick hand Inoo reached up with to adjust his hair before thinking better of it. He decided not to press.

“Group?” He asked instead. He had been unconscious the majority of the time Hikaru had been on the plane for, but had asked for a version of events from everyone on board. “Didn’t… Didn’t Yabu shoot someone?”

“It isn’t my place.” Inoo said sharply, nearly cutting him off, his hand poised above the control pad for the hangar door. “Ask Yabu yourself, or leave it alone. You aren’t entitled, just because you’re smart, to anything you want to know.”

Chinen pursed his lips, directing his gaze to his feet. Inoo sighed.

“It’s classified.” He finally said, tapping the touchpad to open the door. “Unless Hikaru waltzes himself on to this plane, I won’t feel comfortable telling you.”

The hangar door opened slowly, the pairs of legs of their teammates coming into view. It wasn’t until the door was up to their torsos that Chinen realized there was one more body than they had agents, Hikaru standing in front of the whole group, his chest high, his hands behind his back.

“I’ll be damned.” Inoo breathed.

“He’s here for a reason.” Yabu said, a light frown on his face. Hikaru was in one of their interrogation rooms, sitting quietly. They’d confirmed it was actually him, not a copy, and throughout the entire process, he hadn’t spoken at all. They hadn’t attempted to question him either though, so cooperation was yet to be seen.

“What do you mean?” Inoo asked. “We snagged his face from a surveillance feed, went to his location, and captured him. He even fought back, didn’t he?’

Yabu nodded. “Yes, but not hard enough. And he knows how to hide. We shouldn’t have ever seen him in the first place; he’ll go missing for years at a time, aside from the occasional phone calls. He wanted us to find him.”

“Well, we wanted to find him too, so it all works out.”

“Maybe.” Hikaru took his eyes from his shackled wrists, looking up to the video camera pointed his way and meeting Yabu’s eyes. “We won’t know that until we find out what he wants.”


	3. Meet The New Boss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Hikaru now in their custody, Yabu is struggling with who he's supposed to see behind the surveillance cameras. The story of his apprehension is traveling the plane like wildfire, yet everyone is hesitant to call HQ, and the Inhuman in question seems somehow to know much more about them than he should.

“Hey. Wake up.”

Yabu groaned and rolled, not ready for the day to begin, not ready for another twelve hours of training with their mentoring agent, Koichi, stopping when he heard a light giggle. He realized that the room was still dark behind his eyelids, and when he finally opened his eyes, he was met with the excited faces of two of his teammates, illuminated by a flashlight and smiling back at him.

"What’s going on?” He asked, pulling himself into a sitting position. Hikaru hushed him, another giggle escaping Taiyo’s lips.

“We want to explore.” Hikaru whispered. His big brown eyes were light with mischief, a spark that Yabu had noticed upon first meeting the boy. “This new place is so huge. I saw an unmarked staircase on the way back from dinner; I want to know what’s down there.”

“You two want to go down to the basement?”

“It was Hikaru’s idea.” Taiyo added, but if anything he looked most excited by the idea. Fourteen years of age and younger than any of them, he was already the tallest, buzzing with a nervous energy that bounced him from foot to foot.

"But we aren't allowed down there, are we?"

"C'mon!" Hikaru whined. "We already didn't wake Shoon up because we knew he wouldn't come along. It'll be fun. Please come with us?"

Yabu knew he couldn't stop them, and with Hikaru giving him the look he was hitting him with now, Yabu could hear the consent coming from his mouth before he realized he was saying it. Hikaru beamed, handing him a flashlight, and they crept as quietly from the bedroom they shared, leaving a sleeping Shoon behind them.

Yabu felt a chill of exhilaration when they reached the door to the basement, Taiyo completely disregarding the large "DO NOT OPEN" sign as he pulled device from his pocket. The handheld thing was a little electronic he'd scrapped together during his free time that could bypass and unlock just about any door in the building that required a card reader. Yabu himself had used it a few times, but only for more innocent things, like sneaking more food into their bedroom, or when he and Hikaru had nicked the radio from Koichi's office. Nothing like this.

It didn't take long for the door to unlock, Hikaru pulling it open with a creak. The long set of stairs was dark and intimidating, Yabu noticing Taiyo was about as nervous as he was.

"You two, hold up your flashlights." Hikaru told them, clicking his own off and sticking it in the waistband of his pants. They did so, and a second later Hikaru's hand found his in the dark, their fingers fumbling a little as they laced together. Holding hands, the three of them descended the steps together.

Hikaru’s hands were now clasped on the tabletop in front of him, both of his wrists in shackles. Realistically, Yabu knew this was what it would be like when they finally caught him, but some small part of him had hoped against it. That somehow, Hikaru would suddenly be on their side, and not being interrogated across the table.

“Do you think he’s going to talk?” Inoo asked. Yuto was outside the door, about to step in to question him. Hikaru still hadn’t said a word, but Yabu didn’t think that trend would last.

“He’s going to talk. Whether or not he actually answers the questions though… I can’t say that will happen at all.”

Yuto nodded, setting his shoulders.

“I shouldn’t mention Keito, Yamada, or Chinen, should I?”

“You can.” Yabu allotted after a moment of thought. “He already knows about them. Just don’t give him anything he can use.”

Yuto’s brow furrowed in thought for a moment before he nodded, rolling his shoulders and letting out a breath. They didn’t have any set lines of questions for Hikaru, but Yabu trusted Yuto’s judgement in what to ask, and was sure he would do well.

“No pressure if he doesn’t talk.” Inoo said, waving a hand. “We’re turning him into HQ anyway, it’s not on us if we can’t get anything out of him.”

“We are?” Yabu asked quickly, turning on his heel to face the technician.

“Aren’t we?” Inoo asked back, just as surprised as he was. “We were tasked with bringing him in, and we’ve got him now.” Then he frowned. “What did you think we were going to do with him?”

“I don’t know.” Yabu answered honestly. “I hadn’t thought about that.”

Yuto closed the door behind himself, sitting across from Hikaru at the small metallic table. Hikaru just looked at him expectantly.

"Hello." That was as good of an opener as any, Yuto supposed, and Hikaru smiled a little.

"Hello." He said back. "Nakajima Yuto, is it?"

Yuto hadn't yet met Hikaru, not really, only having been in the same room with him for a very short while when the older man had infiltrated their plane. The fact that Hikaru knew his name was surprising, but then he realized he knew Hikaru just as well, if not better, and couldn't have been the only one to do his research.

"And you're Yaotome Hikaru." Yuto sat back in his chair, taking a moment to look over him. Hikaru just looked back. "So, why are you here?"

That made Hikaru laugh a little.

"Because you found me and shackled me up, remember? You were there."

"But we chased you around the world." Yuto countered. "You've been trained, from what I heard. You would know how to disappear if you needed to, but you kept letting us discover your location. Why is that?"

"Now, some of those were accidents, I'll admit. I still have no idea how you knew I was in Okinawa. But what can I say." He shrugged. "I guess you just caught me off guard this time."

"How did you keep evading us?" Yuto didn't notice the frustration he'd allowed to creep into his voice until the words were already out of his mouth. "You were always already gone, but the radius we checked--"

"Your team made two mistakes, every time." Hikaru grinned. "I shouldn't tell you this, but I like you, Yuto. You always assumed that I didn't know you were coming, and you always only searched on the ground."

Yuto nearly cursed out loud, struggling to keep his face passive. A tracker. Hikaru had put a tracker somewhere on their plane before he left, alerting him every time they set course for his location. Not only did that help explain his constant escapes, it also proved what Yabu had been saying; they hadn't caught him off guard at all. Hikaru was here for a reason.

“Why--"

"Enough about me." Hikaru cut him off, his face turning completely serious. "How are Okamoto Keito, Chinen Yuri, and Yamada Ryosuke? Your three Inhumans."

Yuto blinked in surprise. Hikaru knew their names. All of their names, from what he could tell.

"They're fine." He said slowly, but his tone wasn't convincing, Hikaru not breaking eye contact until he said, "Really, I promise. They're all okay. They've been working through their powers, and learning to control them."

Hikaru nodded a little, more to himself than anything as he leaned back into his chair. He drifted into thought for a moment, then glanced back at Yuto again.

"You're quite close with them, aren't you? Keito and Yamada especially. I've heard more about Keito, though."

Yuto could feel his face heating up, trying not to glance at the security cameras.

"Heard that from where?"

"And how's Yabu?" Hikaru shook his head, a small tug on the corners of his lips, Yuto’s question going completely ignored. "This must be tough. I want to talk to him."

The incredible amount of dust was the first thing Yabu, Hikaru, and Taiyo noticed when they made it all the way down the stairs. It was covering all of the boxes that were piled up on rows and rows of shelves, the room not too deep, but long instead, Yabu unable to make out the walls to his left or right, too far away for the beam of his flashlight to reach them. Hikaru dropped their hands once they'd made it, clicking his own light back on and rushing excitedly to one of the boxes. Yabu followed him, Taiyo coming over to his side and doing the same.

"Zero, eight, four." Hikaru read the numbers slowly. They were marked on the side of the black box in white, glowing under the battery-powered light. "What do you think that means?"

"I don't know." Taiyo answered, stepping closer to get a better look at it.

"This one says it too." Hikaru pointed his beam at the box on the shelf above. The handwriting was different, but the numbers were the same. "What's in them? What are they down here for?"

"We probably shouldn't look; nobody has touched that stuff in a long time." Yabu pointed out, running a finger over the an empty part of shelf and showing his friends the dust on his finger. "It might be weapons or something. It’s probably dangerous."

They made their way around the room, looking up and down all of the shelves. Most of the boxes were cardboard, with 'fragile' and 'this way up' written on them. Some of them were black, some of them metallic, and only seven, in total, had the "0-8-4" written on them somewhere.

"What if it's... You know, stuff from aliens?" Taiyo asked. Yabu laughed.

"What?" He protested indignantly. "Koichi told me once that aliens were real. Maybe a few of their things fell to earth, and S.H.I.E.L.D. found it. Isn't that kind of what we're supposed to do?"

"We're supposed to be really cool spies too." Hikaru said with a nod.

"I want to open one." Taiyo declared. They'd made their way back to the shelf by the door, and he pulled down the first black box they'd seen. It was heavier than he seemed to have expected, landing on the concrete floor with a heavy thud. It made Yabu jump nearly a foot in the air, Hikaru hushing him immediately.

"Sorry." He whispered. The latches on the box were loud too, and complex, with a few knobs and a few moving parts. The longer Taiyo fidgeted with the box the more uneasy Yabu got, the feeling rising in his stomach and making the hair on his arms stand up.

"I don't know about--" he began, just as the box opened, the lid flipping up on it's own. A silvery glow was beaming up on their teammate's face, and Yabu couldn't help but look inside.

Whatever was in there, Taiyo had broken it. It looked to have been a set of thin glass vials, and all of them were shattered, the pieces of glass swimming in a shimmery grey liquid. The liquid was beautiful, shining, moving on its own in the new space it had been allowed.

"Wow." Hikaru breathed. Yabu just nodded in response, feeling entranced, not even noticing Taiyo reaching down until he'd touched it, his fingers coming up covered in the thick substance.

"No!" The shout had all of them jumping in shock, looking to the basement door. Koichi was bounding down the stairs, Shoon right behind him, the older man's face a mask of panic. "Get away from that!"

They all did, Yabu nearly tripping over his own feet as he grabbed Hikaru's tiny wrist and yanked them both back. Taiyo scrambled away backwards on his hands and feet, the silver stuff glowing where it was smeared across the floor and beginning to move. It was still gleaming on Taiyo's fingers too, snaking its way up his hand and arm. Koichi had his gun out, Shoon hurrying past him to put a hand on Yabu's shoulder.

"What are you doing down here?" He hissed, eyes wide. Hikaru's explanation and apology spilled from his lips in a panicked rush, his voice dying in his throat when Taiyo cried out.

The liquid had crept up his throat, going into his eyes, ears, nose, and open mouth. His eyes shone first, then his entire body began to glow, Taiyo getting slowly to his feet.

"Ayukawa." Koichi's voice was stern and solid, his gun pointed in Taiyo's direction. "Look at me."

Taiyo did, his eyes blown wide in terror, tears falling down his face as his limbs seemed to move on their own. He took slow steps, his arms hanging as though they had become incredibly heavy, his legs looking as though they were much stronger, and weighed much more than his tiny frame could allow.

"Stop there, or I will shoot." Koichi warned, a sick feeling falling into Yabu's stomach as Taiyo's feet continued to drag forward. He was rooted to the spot, watching Taiyo's glowing eyes, as both Hikaru and Shoon leapt into action.

Hikaru let out a shout as he jumped in front of Koichi, their bodies colliding as the gun went off. They both toppled to the floor as the gun skittered away across the concrete. Shoon ran to Taiyo, putting his hands on his shoulders and giving his body a shake.

"Taiyo, you need to--"

"Please help me." Taiyo whimpered, before his arms jerked at an incredible speed, grabbing Shoon's body and throwing him to the floor. Shoon groaned, rolling to his back with his eyes clenched shut, one of his hands going to the shoulder he had landed on.

"Yabu!" Koichi barked, struggling to push Hikaru's body off him. "He's dangerous! You have to shoot him!"

"He needs help!" Hikaru yelled over him, his voice high and desperate. Taiyo let out another strangled cry, his leg raising up, his foot coming down with a sickening crunch on Shoon's neck. Taiyo wailed, an incredible sound of remorse, terror, and fear, and it was all Yabu could do to scramble for the gun and pull the trigger.

“We had all gone in separate directions--hell, I had to run for ten straight minutes to get to the damn coffee shop--when Daiki said that he was there. I mean, I don’t know why you’re asking me. I was breathing too hard to hear most of it.”

“Aren’t you the one that cuffed him, though?” Yamada asked. He’d heard snippets of the event from various people, finding Takaki and asking for the story. They were both in the garage, Takaki still caught up in the repairs for his motorcycle, and Yamada with a planter, a handful of bulbs, and some fertilizer. He’d looked up ways to curb stress online, his new powers rendering him desperate for something to do, and gardening had sounded more promising to him than getting laid, joining a religious community, or eating a tub of dark chocolate.

“Yeah, I guess that’s true.” Takaki smiled a little at the memory, and Yamada grinned back. “The three of us had reached the coffee shop, and instead of going in Yabu told us to split and surround the building, in case of some back exit he could try and escape through. Daiki was talking to him, being friendly… Acting like Hikaru was some old friend.”

Yamada nodded, chuckling to himself. Daiki was good at that; Daiki had always been good at that. He was undisputedly the best for any undercover mission, always in his element when they had to infiltrate any sort of party.

“Though I guess it didn’t work too well; Hikaru knew who they were, obviously, so he couldn’t diffuse the situation. Walking up to him only cut him off from using the front door. I was walking around the side of the building when I heard Keito shout ‘window!’”

“Window?” Yamada echoed, looking up from his flowers to glance in Takaki’s direction.

“Window.” The mechanic confirmed with a nod. He straightened and stretched, laughing a little. “I heard him over the commlink, obviously, but I heard him from inside the building too, and just as I realized what was happening, Hikaru burst through the window on my side of the coffee shop. He practically landed on me.”

“No.” Yamada grinned in disbelief, putting a hand to his mouth. Takaki pulled out a wrench, bending over the handles of his bike.

“It hurt like hell, obviously, with the glass everywhere. I grabbed him, though I couldn’t really tell what I was grabbing, and he decked me in the face.” Takaki pointed to his jaw, where a bruise had blossomed just below his lip. There was excitement radiating from him, the thrill of telling the story, and the feeling was infectious. “And damn, he recognized who I was, because he said ‘that was for running me over’. I guess he’s still a bit black and blue from this baby.” He patted the side of his motorcycle.

“I can’t see how he wouldn’t be.” Yamada laughed, Takaki looking down at the vehicle with something akin to pride.

“But anyway, that helped me find his wrist, so I cuffed him as the team was running up. I’m so glad Chinen and Inoo developed those power-negating…” He searched for the word, turning to Yamada for help.

“Psuedoplastic restraints?” He tried, getting a near-comical blank stare in return.

“Sure.” Takaki finally said. “That. The handcuffs, or whatever. I told him that this was for making us chase him all the way around the world. Daiki was trying to talk down the shop owner, while Keito hopped through the hole in the window to hand Yuto a cup of coffee.”

Yamada had to laugh at that, packing fertilizer around the small, silent bulbs.

“Then Hikaru and Yabu just sort of… Looked at each other. All of Hikaru’s muscles relaxed, we stood him up, and took him to the plane. Do you know if he’s talked yet?”

Yamada shook his head. “Not that I’ve heard. Yuto was going in to talk to him though, I believe. Something might come of that.” He stood, dusting himself off with a sigh. “Thank you for sharing your garage with me.”

“Of course.”

“What did you plant?”

Yamada glanced down at the planter. It was a wooden box, and he didn’t honestly have too much hope; he wasn’t sure how well the flowers would grow on an airplane.

“Just some roses. I’m…” He shrugged. “We’ll see.”

“I’m sure they’ll be great. Or… Beautiful.” Takaki waved his wrench vaguely, and Yamada laughed.

“Thanks.”

Inoo stepped slowly into the interrogation room, holding his tablet up to his chest.

“Hey.”

Hikaru glanced up at him, his face relaxing as Inoo pulled out a chair and sat down. Then he looked up to the camera watching them, lacing his fingers together.

“Don’t worry.” Inoo had to tell him. “We’re not going to… Do anything to you.”

Hikaru grinned at that. “I know.” He answered. “I’m fine.”

Inoo didn’t quite believe him but decided not to press. He didn’t really have time to either, Hikaru speaking quickly.

“How are they? The Inhumans on your team?”

“I know you’re worried, but Yabu’s doing as he said. They’re fine, working through their powers. Getting pretty good, actually. It’s funny; Chinen’s been Inhuman for the least amount of time, but he’s controlling himself best so far. Though I don’t know why I would have expected anything else. Yamada’s having a rough time, but his powers feel like less of a gift than the others’ do.” He leaned back in his chair, sighing a little and letting his head fall back. “You really don’t need to worry about them.”

“Yes I do. You weren’t there.”

That made Inoo fall silent, his eyes traveling Hikaru’s face. Then he looked down at the table, glancing away.

“What about you?”

“Me?” Hikaru gave him a look of confusion before speaking. “I can… I can clone myself. I can control all of the clones independently, and feel what they’re feeling. Figured you all knew that already.”

“I’m not talking about your powers.” Inoo met his eyes, and Hikaru glanced away.

“Oh. I’m not… Not great. Obviously. I mean, damn, I’m shackled to a table by someone that used to be my best friend. I’m not even the bad guy. I just... I want to talk to Kota.”

“And you’re sure that’s a good idea?”

“I don’t really care if it’ll be good or not anymore. Nothing will probably even come of it. He seems so bent on sending me to HQ that I don’t think anything I could say would change his mind.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.” Inoo looked down at his hands, at the metallic table they were resting on. “I mentioned you going there, and he was surprised. It was like the mission for your head had never existed to him. I don’t think he chased you down for them.”

Hikaru was silent for a long moment, then held his chained wrists up in for Inoo to see.

“How long am I going to be stuck here for?”

Keito blinked and Chinen was across the room, his fist swinging through the empty air.

“Well?” Chinen asked. “Then what?”

He was slightly out of breath and Keito was too, his chest heaving as he tried to speak. He had asked Keito for the story of Hikaru’s apprehension, but they were supposed to be training, so Chinen was trying to get them both done at the same time.

“Then Daiki stood up, and he just started talking. I’m not really sure even he knew what he was saying, because I had no idea. I nearly broke the chair standing up so fast when he went to talk to Hikaru. It was terrifying.”

Chinen frowned a little, rushing up to poke Keito’s cheek. The other agent almost stopped him, Chinen able to feel the air of the punch he threw whistle past his ear.

“Almost.” He told him. “What did Daiki say?”

“He opened with ‘hey man, long time no see!’ Which I guess is sort of true.”

“Sort of.”

“Everybody was looking at us, and Hikaru wasn’t reacting very well. He looked… Almost like a cornered animal. He was really, really confused by what Daiki was doing. He did say hello and give a little wave, but that was about it.”

Chinen snorted in amusement, rushing Keito one more time to poke his nose. Keito missed him again, by a larger margin; he was focused on his story so Chinen decided to stop, wanting to hear it.

“And?” He prompted, Keito hurrying to collect his thoughts and continue.

“And… Well, the rest of the team had been updating us on their positions through the comms, so we were stalling a little until they arrived. We’d blocked the front door, and the back door would sound an alarm, so Hikaru was pretty trapped. His face was showing that he knew it, and then… And then he just looked at me.”

“Looked at you?” Chinen echoed, brows furrowing. Keito nodded.

“He… Yeah. I don’t know why.”

That wasn’t entirely true and Chinen could tell, with the way Keito suddenly avoided his eyes, glancing at the floor and bringing his eyebrows together.

“So I looked away, and he bolted for the window. Too fast for either of us, so I just shouted. He crashed through the glass, and Takaki was there to catch him. They were a mess on the sidewalk, and I think they might have punched each other, I’m not sure--Daiki was trying to talk to the shop owner, who was understandably upset, but he’d messed up his Spanish so badly that the man was about to hurt him, I went to help--and by the time I turned back around, Hikaru was cuffed up and surrounded by the team.” Keito shrugged. “So I gave Yuto the coffee I ordered for him.”

“...that was it?” Chinen finally asked. Keito gave him a look of surprise.

“What do you mean?”

“That’s the tamest apprehension since… Since that time we accidentally took Hard Gay in for questioning! And he actually wanted to come with us because he wanted to keep thrusting in Takaki’s general direction.” Chinen frowned, crossing his legs and taking a seat on the floor. He must have done so faster than he intended, because Keito’s eyes grew the size of saucers before sitting down next to him. “I can’t believe we chased him everywhere, just for that.”

“The questioning isn’t really helping us either.”

Chinen nodded; last he’d heard, the only information Hikaru had given Yuto was that he somehow knew the full names of just about everyone on the plane, information Yabu promised he had never given out. Chinen felt that Yabu was too close to the case to be helping, and they should just keep Hikaru in isolated lockdown until the reached the base, but he also knew he was much too curious to actually suggest that.

“Who knows. Inoo said he was going in to question him, and Inoo’s good at the interrogation game.”

“Maybe he just doesn’t have any intel.” Keito said after a few moments of silence. “He could have just been tired. We weren’t going to let up, and he always knew when we were coming. He knew we weren’t going to stop.”

Chinen shook his head. For some reason, he didn’t think so. Someone that valued his freedom enough to flee as fast and as far as Hikaru had would have done more to get away than punching Takaki in the face. That wasn’t even a special occurrence on this plane. It had to be something else.

“C’mon.” He said with a sigh, tapping Keito on the shoulder and standing up. “We need to practice, and we aren’t about to solve any mysteries just sitting around the floor of the gym like this. I told Yabu that today would be the day you landed a punch on me.”

“I’m trying!” Keito insisted, Chinen reaching up to ruffle his hair before dashing out of reach.

“Are you sure you want to go in there?” Inoo asked. He was in Yabu’s office, and Yabu was sitting at his desk, watching the video feed of Hikaru in the holding room. He was just sitting still, his hands in his lap, giving occasional glances to the video cameras. “We asked him all the questions we had, and we didn’t really get much. Shouldn’t we just call a meeting, and see what to do now?”

“I… No. I’m going to talk to him.” Yabu pulled himself to his feet. He wanted to see Hikaru, he really did, despite the tight ball of nerves in his stomach. Inoo frowned.

“Okay. Should I gather everyone else in the conference room?”

Yabu nodded in consent, and after one more glance at the screen, he left his office. He stopped in front of the holding room, taking a breath and needlessly straightening out his clothes. He didn’t know why he was going in, or what he was going to say, but when he walked in, Hikaru met his eyes and smiled.

“Hey. It’s been a while.”

“Sort of.” Yabu responded, giving him a small smile back.

“No, really.” Hikaru brought his clasped hands up to the table, Yabu noticing that the handcuffs were missing. Hikaru was just sitting there, completely unrestrained. “When was the last time we were just talking to each other?”

“Years.” Yabu said with a nod, trying not to let the surprise show on his face as he attempted to think up what to do. If Inoo had already called the meeting, there wasn’t going to be anyone watching the cameras, and he’d left his phone in his office. There was no way for Yabu to communicate the situation, and nothing stopping Hikaru from escaping. But he was just sitting there.

“I’ve heard from the others that the Inhumans are alright. Thank you for that.”

“Of course--” Yabu began, but Hikaru held a hand up.

“There have been cases in the United States; something is going around and killing us. That and the angry people.” He shrugged. “So I just wanted to make sure.”

“That’s the reason you’re here?” Yabu asked, surprised. “You got yourself captured for that?”

“We have to look out for each other.” Hikaru got to his feet, and Yabu shifted in front of the door. “I know you don’t have the crystal anymore, and that’s fine, but I’ll say it again: I want the Inhumans to come with me.”

“I’m not going to let you leave.”

“Kota--”

“Drop the act in front of me, okay?” Yabu reached out, putting his hands on Hikaru’s shoulders, and Hikaru blinked in surprise, completely disarmed by Yabu touching him. “You’ve been acting weird in front my team. Blunt. Cocky. This isn’t you.”

“It has been years since we talked to each other.” Hikaru pointed out, but made no move to pull away. “Maybe you don’t know me anymore.”

“I don’t want to turn you into HQ. You know more about this Inhuman thing than I do; I want to add you to the team Hikaru, if you'll have us.”

“Kota…”

“S.H.I.E.L.D. has changed too. You left over ten years ago. We've learned since then. About everything.” Yabu was hoping that maybe, against all odds, he could convince Hikaru to stay.

“I…” Hikaru looked to be considering it, but then his eyes shifted to the door, and Yabu realized what was about to happen. He tried to tighten his grip on Hikaru’s shoulder but he was easily shaken off, Hikaru throwing up an elbow and hitting Yabu in the face. The force had him stumbling back, his body slamming into the table behind them as Hikaru reached for the door and wrenched it open. For one short, stupid second Yabu thought he was seeing double from the force of the blow, blinking, two Hikarus exiting the room and heading down the hallway in separate directions.

As he was running for the conference room, the plane-wide alarm began to blare, signaling the lowering of the cargo doors in the garage. It was Inoo and Yamada who found him, both of them worried and concerned as he stopped in front of them, trying to breathe.

“Escaped… Handcuffs were off… Garage--”

“The rest of the team are headed there now. Only a few of them have icers; I think Chinen is going to try and trip him up.” Inoo reached out, touching Yabu’s upper lip, his fingers coming away bloody. Yabu did the same; adrenaline was pumping too strongly through his veins for him to have felt the injury. “What happened?”

Chinen had raced ahead of them, out of sight in an instant, Keito trying his best to keep up with Yuto’s long strides as they followed after him. Takaki and Daiki were the only ones who’d had icers in their waistbands when the meeting was called, and thus were the only ones with weapons; Keito had no idea what Chinen was planning to do when he reached the garage, but concern for the little agent’s safety was front and foremost in his mind.

Hikaru and a clone were both in the garage, fighting back as Chinen rushed them. An unbelieveable wind was whipping through the entire cargo bay, the door lowered just enough to slip under.

“Chinen!” Takaki shouted to him. He was extending his icer out, maybe for Chinen to take it--his super speed made him a more precise shot than any of the rest of them--but all it served to be was a distraction, Hikaru pulling his own gun out and firing. Momentum kept Chinen moving after the dendrotoxin met its mark, Keito stooping to catch him.

The Hikaru that was a clone disapparated, the original turning to slip from the plane when Yuto shouted, launching himself at the ex-agent. Their bodies collided, the force knocking them both to the ground in struggling tangle of limbs. The door opened behind them and Yabu came in, bleeding from his top lip with slight panic on his face.

“Hikaru! Stop!” He shouted, and that caught the two’s attention, the struggle stopping for a second. Hikaru took advantage of the moment, his arms constricting around Yuto’s torso. It was as though they realized what was happening all at once, Keito watching helplessly, only able give a shout of protest as Hikaru rolled over the edge, dragging Yuto with him as they fell together from the plane.


	4. The Inside Man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Hikaru gone and Yuto in tow, the entire team is stressed and stretched thin. The Inhumans, however, feel particularly impacted; Chinen is bearing responsibility for Hikaru's escape on his shoulders, Keito's powers have skyrocketed out of his control, and Yamada is bearing a secret that could tear their team apart.

“Do… Do you think he’s alright?”

Yamada didn’t need to use his powers to know how desperately Keito needed the reassurance, so despite his complete lack of knowledge, he nodded. Keito’s stress wasn’t relieved at all.

“They didn’t die when they fell, we know that.” Yamada started, Keito nodding along to his words. “Yabu knows Hikaru, and he told us Hikaru isn’t a killer. Yuto’s big and brave. He’ll be alright.”

“But--”

There was a loud snap, the trowel Keito was holding breaking at the hilt. Keito let out a sigh and let the tool fall from his hands, muttering out an apology. Yamada could feel the remorse, but it was so overshadowed by poorly subdued panic that Yamada was barely able to detect it. Keito had been nothing but a ball of worry, guilt, and fear since Hikaru had escaped that anything he attempted was proving impossible. After bending a fork and shattering a glass when he tried to eat with the rest of them, Yabu ordered him to go and calm down enough to become functional, because they needed him. So Yamada asked if Keito wanted to help tend the small garden he had in the garage. It hadn’t been going well.

“But why him?” Keito asked, glancing away from the sprouting bulbs, as though afraid he would break the planter box too by simply looking at it. “Why did Hikaru take Yuto? Didn’t he want… Us? Inhumans? He even asked about us in his interrogation, he knows who we are.”

“Maybe it was just because Yuto was there.” Yamada suggested, shrugging as he covered a succulent seed with dirt. “He was much more interested in us than Yuto, sure, but he was trying to escape and Yuto was trying to stop him. He couldn’t take you, anyway, you’re too strong. And Chinen’s too fast. I’m…”

He… He wasn’t anything. Yamada couldn’t do anything with what he’d been given. If he was supposed to use his ability for something, he didn’t know what. All he’d been able to do so far was give himself migraines or near panic attacks if he was in a room with too many people for too long. He had been learning ways to cope with his newfound powers, but they still felt more like a curse than a blessing.

“But why didn’t he just escape? Why take Yuto at all?” Keito asked again. Yamada fixed him with a sympathetic look.

“He’s going to be fine. He’s going to be used for leverage against us if anything, so Hikaru will need him alive for that at least.”

“Leverage against us?”

Yamada could tell instantly that he had said the exact wrong thing. Every one of Keito’s negative emotions spiked, the change so forceful that Yamada felt the breath punched out of his lungs. He took in a deep gasp but his chest hurt, an invisible heel driven into his diaphragm. He held a hand out, his fingers grasping, touching Keito’s arm. The pressure on him doubled, the force bending his back, squeezing his eyes shut as a spasm wracked his body. Keito’s emotions flowed harshly across his palm and through his fingertips.

“Yamada?”

Yamada felt Keito’s worry too, passing over him in a wave, and he tried to send back some positive emotion, some assurance of comfort. Slowly, ever so slowly, the panic began to ebb away, overpowered by Yamada’s own projection. Keito reached over and picked up the remaining empty planter box, calm enough that for the first time since Hikaru’s escape something didn't splinter in his hands.

“Thank you.” Keito murmured, looking down at Yamada’s hand. Yamada just nodded, trying not to seem as surprised as he felt by this new discovery.

“We need you, Keito. You and your strength. You can’t beat yourself up over this; there was nothing we could do. Hikaru has a way of popping up on the radar, so we’ll be able to get to them in no time. But for right now, the team needs you in control.”

Keito nodded slightly, and Yamada drew his hand away.

“I’ll feel better when we have our course of action. Some sort of plan. Yabu and Inoo are in the lab, right? Talking things over? You were with Inoo after he came out of the interrogation room; did he say anything to you about Hikaru?”

Yamada shook his head, frowning as he sunk into thought. Words had never been something to rely too heavily on when it came to Inoo, and Yamada had learned to take things he said with a grain of salt and a second opinion. He’d hoped decoding his fellow agent would come easier with his abilities and in some ways, it had. But Inoo told him something during Hikaru’s escape, something Yamada knew he wasn't supposed to hear, and as was the usual with their tech man, it was a message he hadn’t been able to understand.

“Keito, can I ask you something?”

Takaki’s steps were loud and fast as he made his way to the lab. Only Inoo and Yabu were there, but they were enough.

“What’s the plan?”

“Calm down.” Inoo said shortly, extending his arm out just far enough to hit him lightly in the chest. “You just fixed your motorcycle, you shouldn’t run him over with it again just yet.”

Sometimes Takaki wondered if Inoo could read minds.

“But what are we going to do? We need to get Yuto back as soon as possible.”

“I know.” Yabu said with a sigh, pursing his lips and looking at the screen. Inoo was skipping through the security footage of the interrogation room. He passed Hikaru and Yuto’s conversation, his and Hikaru’s conversation, stopping it when he left the room.

“Well, Takaki, we don’t know where he is. We did an extensive search of their projected landing point, and there wasn’t anything there. No bodies, so even though neither of them had landing gear, they made it somewhere, somehow. I’ve already got all of the servers searching for matches for both of them on security cameras.”

He fell silent, his eyes fixed on the screen, Yabu leaning in close next to him.

“When did he move his hands under the table?” Yabu asked, and Inoo shrugged.

“While I was talking to him.” He answered. “He was still handcuffed.”

“Why don’t we have a camera under that table?” Takaki asked, the director and the technician both giving him a look.

“Because that’s creepy.” Inoo deadpanned, and Takaki shrugged a little.

“Shut up, I don’t know.”

“So we don’t know how he got away, we don’t know why he took Yuto with him, and we don’t know where he’s going.” Yabu said with a sigh, Takaki watching as the on-screen Yabu walked into the interrogation room, Hikaru laying his miraculously freed hands on the table. “Great.”

“He might not have meant to take Yuto, though.” Inoo said. “Maybe Yuto was just… There.”

“So what, he just accidentally grabbed him?” Takaki couldn’t help but ask, and Yabu gave Inoo a small, skeptical glance. “He’s got Yuto for a reason, and we need to get him back.”

“We’re working on it.” Yabu told him, but it wasn’t reassuring. “We have the servers running, and he has to pop up again. It wouldn’t make any sense for him to take a hostage and not use him.”

Yabu’s expression was hardened, and Takaki swallowed. Inoo leaned back in his chair, making eye contact with their director.

“We need to tell HQ about this.” He said seriously, and Yabu sighed again. The agent stood, tablet in hand, his voice carrying more insistence. “They need to know. We didn’t even tell them we had Hikaru on the plane; he wasn’t here long enough. But this has gotten bad. An agent is M.I.A. They need to know.”

“I know.” Yabu answered resignedly. “Do you two want to come to my office with me? I’ll get them on the phone.”

Takaki blinked in surprise. Inoo had stood readily, nodding to the offer, but he himself hadn’t ever had much contact with HQ after completing his training and being assigned to a unit. He disliked the paperwork and formalities, and tried his best to steer clear of it. This time though he found himself nodding along, following Inoo out of the lab and down the hallway outside.

Chinen stepped back, breathing hard, and Daiki couldn’t hold in a wince. Once things in the plane had calmed down Chinen had stormed off, saying he was going to train. Yabu had requested someone go with him, and as Daiki was already concerned for the little agent, he’d offered to go. He felt that Chinen would do much better with a meal and a nap than hand wraps and a punching bag after to that shot of dendrotoxin to the chest Hikaru had given him, but Chinen had studied the tranquilizer extensively when it became standard issue ammo, so Daiki had to assume Chinen knew what he was doing.

Daiki saw Chinen’s jaw clench and he began again, dealing strong and measured punches to the bag in front of him. The punching bag was easily as large and heavy as he was but the force of his fists had the bag swinging, his arms moving exponentially faster. Pain grew on his face as his fists flew, so fast they were nearly blurry, and Daiki began to see streaks of red appearing both on the punching bag and on his knuckles.

“Chinen!” He exclaimed in alarm, hurrying forward. Chinen didn’t seem to hear him, jumping when Daiki put a hand on his shoulder. “Stop it.”

Chinen did, swallowing hard and letting his battered knuckles fall to his sides.

“Are you okay?” Daiki asked. “You know Chinen, I really don’t think--”

“It’s my fault.” Chinen said, his voice sharp. “I should have been able to stop him. I shouldn’t have let that happen. So I have to train.”

“You didn’t ‘let’ anything happen.” Daiki told him, getting a glance of annoyance in return. “Nobody blames you, alright? Hikaru shot you, and then Yuto jumped at him but he escaped. There wasn't anything you could have done.”

“I could have kicked him in the teeth when I had the chance.” Chinen responded dryly. Daiki sighed.

“Chinen--”

“I could have not gotten shot.”

The sentence hung in the air, Daiki taking in a slow breath.

“Nobody's that fast.”

“Well, I'm going to be.” His face set, Chinen turned back to the punching bag. Daiki could already tell that there was nothing he could say that would deter Chinen so he just frowned a little, holding the bag steady.

“Okay, but don't push yourself too hard.” He insisted, Chinen beginning to bounce up and down on the balls of his feet. “You don’t need to feel guilty for what happened. I'm sure Yuto is fine.”

Yuto was more than fine. And it was weird. Hikaru sat across from him at a small wooden table, a few boxes of takeout between them. One of his wrists was cuffed to the arm of his chair, the other free so he could eat.

“Is… Is the ramen okay? I could get you something else, I didn’t think to ask--”

“It’s fine.” Yuto said quietly, hesitant, Hikaru falling silent in the middle of his nervous hospitality. His kidnapper’s eyes cast back down to his plate and Yuto readjusted his chopsticks, figuring he should probably eat. He knew there was nothing wrong with the food--Hikaru had ordered it, accepted it from the delivery man, and set it out on the table all in plain sight for Yuto to see---but it was so drilled into his head not to eat in hostile situations that touching the food hadn’t crossed his mind.

In all honesty though, this wasn’t a hostile situation. Hikaru had actually apologized midway through their rushing fall towards the ground, Yuto extremely grateful they hadn’t searched Hikaru thoroughly on his arrival when the former agent pulled a small device from deep inside his jacket pocket. He’d shouted at Yuto to hold on to him, then split the circular device in half and attached one piece to the bottom of each shoe. Seeing no alternative where he could make it out of this alive, Yuto had done what he was told.

Yuto took a small bite of the food, surprised by how good it tasted. He decided to break the silence and tell Hikaru so, who smiled the smallest bit.

“Being on the run does make me miss cooking, but it helped me find what chain restaurants are the best.” He responded with a nod. Yuto nodded back, wanting to keep the conversation rolling. As with any other standard kidnapping scenario, Yuto wanted to perhaps get Hikaru to like or trust him more, so he could look for a means to escape.

“So you like to cook then?” He asked. Hikaru nodded again, looking up from his food.

“You don’t have to be so nervous.” He said, Yuto blinking in surprise. “I’m not going to hurt you. I don’t even intend to keep you here, really. I just don’t want S.H.I.E.L.D. to know where this place is, if that’s alright.”

Yuto didn’t answer. That wouldn’t be a problem; after falling out of the plane the way he had, he didn’t even know what country he was in. The deliveryman had spoken in English, but it was accented in a way he didn’t recognize.

_Keito would know._

The thought of his fellow agent stung so much that Yuto almost felt guilty, and he swallowed. He’d been kidnapped before, and while that had been a tearful, stressful ordeal, he couldn’t imagine what kind of state Keito must be in now with his newfound abilities.

“Why do you want to hide?”

“Well, if your team didn’t like me before, they definitely won’t like me after this.” There was a hint of humor in his tone, but he wasn’t smiling. “And I’ll need a few places to keep the Inhumans safe.”

“The Inhumans?” Yuto echoed, swallowing. “You’re going to use me to make them come with you?”

“I didn’t intend to.” Hikaru said with a sigh, and against his better judgement, Yuto found himself believing the ex-agent. It didn’t help the fear in his chest, though, the prospect of losing the Inhumans on the team causing his shackled fist to clench.

“I’m not going to let you have them.” His words came out more harshly than he expected, but he didn’t flinch away from them. Hikaru just returned to his food, fishing around his plate with his chopsticks.

“I’m not asking you.”

Daiki’s fists were slow, Chinen able to see the muscles in his arm tensing as he swung. He could have dodged easily but decided to block instead, the older agent’s face registering slight surprise as his arm slowed to make the hit feather light against his forearm. Chinen stepped back a pace, returning with a few punches of his own, Daiki not moving fast enough to give a responding block. Chinen let his knuckles connect with Daiki’s chest and side, making sure to slow any power behind them as he did.

Instead of retaliating though, Daiki paused. Chinen realized that his sparring partner wasn’t paying attention to their fight anymore, his eyes on the door. Chinen turned.

Yamada was standing there, looking hesitant, Keito behind him with a concerned expression.

“Are you two okay? What’s up?” Daiki asked as he began walking over, Chinen following quickly. Yamada met them in the middle of the room, Keito trailing behind. Both of them looked nervous, and Yamada swallowed before speaking.

“There’s something I need to talk to you guys about.”

“Of course.” Daiki said instantly, Chinen’s ears pricked in curiosity. “What is it?”

“Something has been bothering me since…” Yamada trailed off, then took a deep breath and began again. “I was with Inoo when Hikaru escaped. When Yabu ran up to us, saying he had gotten free somehow, Inoo didn't feel surprised in any way. Yabu was a mess, stressed and scared and in shock, but Inoo was… Much more relaxed. Like it was something he expected.”

The implication hung heavy in the air, Chinen realizing what Yamada was saying.

“But--” Daiki began, Yamada giving him a nervous glance. “If Inoo wasn't surprised, then... are you saying he must have known?”

“Inoo was the last person to talk to Hikaru before Yabu went in there.” Chinen realized, Yamada meeting his eyes and nodding.

“You don’t mean…” Daiki looked between them, turning to Chinen. “Did Inoo have access to the handcuff keys?”

“He didn’t _not_ have access.” Chinen said. “I just left them on one of the lab tables, I think.

“If he did something, it should show up on the security cameras, right?”

“Well yes, but--”

“But if he did something, he would have tampered with the footage.” Chinen finished, Yamada nodding. “It’s still worth it to look.”

Chinen was extremely tense as they walked down to the lab. He knew, logically, that there was no reason for him to worry about anyone seeing them as they went--the lab was as much his as it was Inoo’s, after all--but he still felt the need to be as quiet as possible. The others seemed to feel the same way, their walk through the hallways completely silent.

Denial was first and forefront in his mind. He had been next to and trusted Inoo for years. They’d worked missions, made breakthroughs, and saved lives together, the idea of anything painting that in a bad light leaving a sick feeling in his stomach.

Still though, there was that nagging doubt. An alternate reality already backed up by the claims of a person that had no reason to lie. It made sense in a weird and uncomfortable way, and Chinen hoped more than anything that when they watched the security footage back they would see something the others had missed, some trick Hikaru had used to get free.

The lab was empty when they reached it, Chinen letting out a silent sigh of relief and sitting behind one of the screens. It was easy to find the footage of Hikaru’s interrogation room; it had been recently accessed.

“There it is.” Yamada pointed. “Open it.”

Recently accessed meant it had already been looked over, Chinen knowing in that moment that they wouldn’t find anything by watching it. He played it anyway though, that suspicion only being confirmed. It had been wiped clean, and he wouldn’t be able to retrieve anything; Inoo knew workarounds on these computers that Chinen himself didn’t even know existed. He wasn’t the lab’s tech agent.

“How can we be sure?” Daiki asked. “We can’t go to the director with a… A feeling. Not that I don’t believe you,” he added quickly to Yamada, who nodded “but still.”

“We won’t get anything from looking at the files Inoo would be worried about.” Chinen murmured, scrolling through dates and video files. He landed on the security feed--for not the interrogation room Hikaru was in--but for the lab on the day he escaped. He watched Inoo moving around the room for a few moment before beginning his search of the screen, looking until he found the keys for Hikaru’s cuffs. As he’d expected he’d left them there, splayed carelessly out on the table. He zoomed in, watching them intently, waving off questions from both Yamada and Keito until finally, the footage jumped. Chinen hit pause, rewinding it and playing it back in slow motion, his heart sinking at the skip in the video.

“Wait, is that…?” Keito asked hesitantly, and Chinen nodded.

“Inoo moved the keys for Hikaru’s handcuffs. He did it.” He confirmed. Daiki’s face set, pulling his icer from his waistband.

“We need to find him. I have a lot of questions.”

“He’s bound to turn up.”

Yabu nodded, running his thumb over his bottom lip as he paced the floor. Getting chewed out by HQ was never fun, but it was better when it happened to him alone. Takaki and Inoo had simply stood in the background in his office and watched as he’d been yelled at for his incompetence, his irresponsibility, and his complete disregard for the lives of the agents under his control. They demanded results and signed off, Yabu still bent in an apologetic bow long after the superiors had disappeared from the screen. Takaki let out a long low whistle, simply saying he was glad he wasn’t the director, Inoo laughing and nodding in agreement. Then they turned to the computers, continuing the scan for Hikaru or Yuto.

“Yeah, I know.” Yabu said with a sigh, rubbing his face with his hands. “Yuto’s not an Inhuman, so Hikaru doesn’t want him.”

“He’s not going to hurt him though, right?” Takaki asked hesitantly, and Yabu didn’t answer. He didn’t think so, but he knew he couldn’t say for sure. Kidnapping Yuto wasn’t something he’d ever expected Hikaru to do, so he genuinely wasn’t sure anymore.

“No.” Inoo answered instead, his voice surprisingly steadfast. Yabu glanced over at him, about to ask about what had him so convinced when Takaki shouted, pointing at the screen.

“Yuto!” He exclaimed, Yabu whipping around. The computer had frozen, blinking, about two-thirds of a face Yabu recognized instantly showing up from a low quality security camera feed. Yabu’s eyes scanned the coordinates, about to turn from the room to get Daiki. As if on cue, the agent entered his office.

He didn’t walk in as much as he skidded down the hallway and through the door, his icer drawn and pointed in Inoo’s direction. Inoo dropped his tablet to the floor and jumped back, his arms already up in surrender, Takaki pulling his own icer out and pointing it at Daiki. Yabu stood stock still, trying to assess the situation, the clatter of Takaki’s weapon hitting the floor making him jump; Chinen had rushed in and kicked it from his hands.

“Put your weapon down.” Yabu told Daiki, who shook his head defiantly.

“Not until I’ve escorted Inoo to the interrogation room.”

There was a tense silence, Daiki unwavering and Inoo wide-eyed, looking at Yabu for some kind of help. Then Keito entered the doorway, seeing Yuto on the computer screen and gasping. He gripped at the door but the handle snapped under his hands, Yamada behind him with a grip on his shoulder. Yabu didn’t know what to do.

“People need to start talking. Now.”

Yabu paused, resting his hand against the interrogation room door and letting his eyes fall closed. It was all too much. Daiki’s explanation--with help from the rest of the team--had been extremely circumstantial, but Inoo hadn’t denied anything. He hadn’t defended himself at all, angling his face to the floor and letting his bangs fall to cover his eyes, keeping his arms up in a hands-where-I-can-see-them position and his mouth shut. Since he hadn’t spoken up, Yabu had no choice but to let Daiki escort him from the office and into interrogation, hoping he could go in there and get some kind of explanation from the agent. Swallowing hard, he pushed the door open.

Inoo looked up, but didn’t greet him. Yabu pulled out the chair across from him and sat heavily, letting silence settle for a few minutes as he chose his words.

“Did you or did you not assist Yaotome Hikaru in his escape?” He finally asked. Inoo met his eyes, holding his gaze.

“I did.”

“In what way?”

“I unlocked his handcuffs, then altered the security footage.”

“Why?”

Inoo blinked. Yabu watched him swallow, and the eye contact was lost. He wasn’t answering.

“Have the two of you been working together?”

The following silence stretched longer than the first, Yabu sitting forward in his chair.

“In what ways have you been collaborating with him? When did it start?”

“After our team had come in contact with the terrigen crystal, and he called your cell phone. Hikaru had encountered the crystal already, and I needed to know what had happened to Yamada upon touching it. I wanted to find a way to help our teammates.”

Yabu already felt hesitant, unsure of how much of this story he could believe. It was always hard to tell with Inoo what was truth, a lie, or a joke.

“And he told me. He told me everything; what had happened to him, what was going to happen to Yamada, and he told me he was coming. He promised not to do any harm, but… He did warn me about you.”

“Me? What--”

“You’ve killed a powered teammate before.” Inoo’s words were sharp. Yabu drew away, his back hitting his chair behind him.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“When Hikaru left the plane the first time, unsuccessful, I began giving him updates. I told him that I was keeping an eye on you, but he was growing concerned about the lack of progress that Yamada and Keito were having--that Yamada is still having, if we’re honest--”

Yabu’s eyes flicked quickly to the video camera in the corner, one of the many that were sending both visuals and audio of this meeting up to the lab, where the rest of the team were watching. Inoo simply continued.

“--and he decided he wanted to try and help. So he used the tracker I’d placed in the engine room to get himself captured. He wanted to talk to Keito, Chinen, and Yamada… And he wanted to talk to you.”

“No he didn’t.”

“He misses you.”

Yabu had to look away, directing his eyes to the table.

“Why help him, Inoo? Why don’t you trust me?”

“I think you’re a good person, Kota. I do. But you have an obligation to S.H.I.E.L.D., and to the government, and that connection is the last thing the Inhumans need. They need someone that understands them and can help them work through their powers at their own pace, without the obligation of getting back on the mission breathing constantly down their neck. That’s what Hikaru can do for them.”

“Do you think I would hurt them?”

“I think they make you nervous.” There was no shying away from the answer, no hint of shame or apology in Inoo’s voice. “I think they make you apprehensive. I think that if they made a wrong move and you had a real gun in your hands, you wouldn’t hesitate.”

Yabu couldn’t help himself, jumping to his feet and slamming his hands on the table, shouting before he realized the words that were leaving his mouth.

“You weren’t there!” Inoo looked up at him, composed almost to a point of looking nonchalant. “You didn’t see the way Taiyo was moving, and crying, and Shoon’s neck once he’d crushed it… I had to kill him.” Painful emotions were rising in his chest, but Yabu couldn’t tell if they were remorse or panic. “Koichi told me to. I had no other choice.”

“I’m not going to fault you for following orders.”

“I was saving lives!” His fist fell heavy on the tabletop, the loud sound echoing around the room. “But I would never… Not to them. Not to our team.”

“I know you care for them but so do I, and I have done nothing to harm anyone.” Inoo said. Yabu turned away, walking a few paces from the interrogation table and trying to swallow down his emotions.

“I only wanted to help Hikaru escape.” Inoo continued. “Yuto going with him… That was never part of the bargain. I still don’t know why it happened, and I don’t know where they went. But we just got a hit on them, so I suggest we get moving.”

“You’re staying here.” Yabu told him, his voice sharper than he had meant it. Inoo moved his hands from his lap to the tabletop, his fingers clasped. Yabu glanced quickly, but the tech agent was still cuffed securely, simply looking up at him.

“I would expect nothing less.”

Keito peeked his head into the cockpit, knocking hesitantly. Daiki turned his head at the sound.

“Come in.” He allotted, Keito smiling gratefully and ducking inside to sit in the copilot seat.

“Are we almost there?” He asked, looking over the deep green forest flashing past below them. Daiki nodded.

“There's a town just on the other side of this forest, and that's where we're headed.”

Silence fell over the cockpit. Part of Keito was dying to talk to Daiki about Inoo, but he didn’t want to force the subject on him, especially if Daiki was staying silent for a reason. He struggled for a moment for anything else to say, distracted when a speck of _something_ in the vast clearing ahead caught his attention.

“Daiki, wait.” Keito leaned forward, pulling down the overhead binoculars and squinting. “It’s…” Emotion surged through him and he loosened his grip, as not to do any damage. “It’s Yuto and Hikaru.”

“What?” Daiki pulled up on the handles, slowing the plane to a comfortable crawl and pulling his own binoculars down in front of his eyes. He cursed softly, slowing down even more. “You’re right. We’re landing here. Go tell the others.”

Keito nodded, jumping to his feet and rushing from the cockpit. He tapped the shoulder of whoever he saw, giving them the short version of events and telling them to get to the garage. Once the team was down there he headed down himself, his heart hammering in his chest, struggling to keep him body still.

Gently, the plane touched down. The door lowered slowly and there the two of them were, standing, Hikaru positioning Yuto slightly in front of him. Every armed member of the team had their guns up and pointed at the two of them, Takaki looking to Yabu.

“Should I shoot?” He asked. Yabu shook his head.

“It’s probably not really him.” Yabu murmured back. “If we shoot, he’d just disappear.”

“I’m not here for any ransom. I don’t want anything from you; I just ask that you listen.” Hikaru began, his voice clear and calm. He caught Keito’s eye, who felt his breath catch in his throat before he glanced away. “I’m here to talk to the Inhumans.”

Keito’s eyes traveled Yuto’s body. Thankfully, he didn’t seem hurt, impaired, or restrained in any way. He simply stood there, Hikaru holding tight to his shoulder, almost as though he was allowing Hikaru to speak.

“I know you love this team. I know these are your friends, and you’ve been training for this team your whole lives, but… S.H.I.E.L.D. isn’t a safe place for you. I want to give the three of you a safe place to explore what you can do, out of the stress of others and without any crushing pressure to improve.”

Yamada glanced up at that, Keito glancing over to see Hikaru looking straight at him.

“There’s a healthy environment for the exploration and growth you all need, and it isn’t here. S.H.I.E.L.D.’s stance on Inhumans is worryingly unclear, and your powers won’t wait for the government to sort itself out. I’ve worked through my abilities; I know how hard this is for you.”

Keito swallowed, looking down at his hands. When it came down to it, his powers had made him feel like a monster. He couldn’t control himself, crushing things and people without meaning to, afraid of his own strength. Chinen had slid into his abilities so easily that he was left feeling painfully inadequate, starting over from scratch, able to do nothing but hurt when all he wanted was to help his fellow agents.

“I’m not going to make you do anything. I’m going to give Agent Nakajima back to you, but before I do I wanted to ask for any of you that think there may be even the possibility that I could help you to come with me.”

Keito was brought back to Inoo’s questioning, the interrogation they had all watched on the lab computers.

_”They need someone that understands them and can help them work through their powers at their own pace, without the obligation of getting back on the mission breathing constantly down their neck. That’s what Hikaru can do for them.”_

Nobody moved. Hikaru's eyes fell to his feet and be pushed Yuto forward, the tall agent tripping over the lip of the garage door as he stumbled back onto the plane. Part of Keito wanted to say something, wanted to move or speak up, but then Yuto met his eyes, and Keito knew he couldn’t. He belonged here.

“Daiki, we've got him.” Keito heard Yabu say softly, realizing the director must be wearing a commlink to communicate with the cockpit. “Let's go.”

The engines revved instantly, Hikaru falling from view as the plane ascended, the door folding up to close.

“Wait!” Came a strangled shout, Keito jumping at the noise; Yamada ran forward, his fist pounding against the garage door, but it was closed, the plane easily already a hundred feet up. A shocked, uneasy silence followed, all eyes turning back to Yuto once the ascension had leveled out, the plane moving smoothly through the air. Yuto looked back at Keito and smiled.

His legs were moving before he even realized it, running forward to pull Yuto in for a tight hug, his whole body heaving in a sigh of relief. Yuto gripped him back just as tightly, Keito’s heart jumping as he felt a few hasty kisses being pressed into his hair.

“Hey, Keito…” Yuto murmured after a few moments, his voice sounding muffled. “I love you too, but… You're crushing me.”

Keito jumped back, already apologizing, but when he looked up Yuto was still smiling.

“Yuto.” Yabu was there, his hand on Yuto’s shoulder. “Are you hurt?”

Yuto shook his head quickly, a little of the tension leaving Yabu’s shoulders.

“Good, good. I need you to tell us everything.”


	5. Many Heads, One Tale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team has Yuto back, but unspoken tensions are still there, hanging in the air. Before they're given time to deal with anything, they're dispatched out on another retrieval mission. The mission is supposed to be easy, but 'easy' is never really true in their line of work.

“Gravitonium.”

Chinen could feel Inoo’s eyes on him, hearing a laugh.

“Come on. That element is a myth.”

“No, no. It’s been recreated in labs three times now, twice in Russia and once in the U.S.”

“Oh?” Chinen turned, and Inoo was looking back at him, skeptical. “And what is it supposed to do, anyway?”

“I’m looking into it, hold on.” Chinen turned back to their power computer, clicking through a few of the files, scanning them quickly. “Atomic number 123, atomic mass 308… Here it is.” Inoo walked over, the weight of his head resting on his shoulder to listen as Chinen read aloud. “‘Gravitonium possesses unique gravitational properties. A mass of gravitonium atoms distorts gravity fields within itself’.”

“How do you recreate that?” Inoo asked. “How do you create something that can distort its own gravity?”

Chinen held a hand up. “Hold on. ‘When stimulated by an electrical current, the mass of gravitonium will solidify into a uniform sphere, and cause powerful gravity fields to emanate outwardly from it’.”

“It can change gravity fields and create them?” Inoo smirked. “You need to make me some of that. We have enough equipment here at HQ to do it, don’t we? Think of all the pranks we could pull. We could put the toilets on the ceiling.”

Chinen hushed him and kept reading.

“‘These gravity fields cause changes in the rules of gravity in various ways within a certain proximity of it’.”

“The more you tell me about this stuff, the more dangerous it sounds.” Inoo said, and this time he sounded serious. “Really dangerous, actually. You could kill someone with that stuff.”

“As with everything in science.” Chinen responded with a sigh. Then something vibrated against his butt and he jumped, Inoo laughing and pulling his phone from his front pocket.

“Sorry, I wasn’t excited to see you. There’s something in my pocket.” Inoo told him, Chinen sticking his tongue out in response, though he couldn’t help but laugh a bit all the same. He watched Inoo check his phone, then raise his eyebrows. “We’re being called to the jet. All of us.”

“All of us as in…” Chinen looked around, noticing how empty the lab was. “As in us two? Or…?”

“No, all of us.” Inoo repeated, leading the way out of the lab. “The team is getting back together again. We’re headed to Australia. You ready for another mission?”

“Oh, god yes.” Chinen breathed, speeding up his footsteps. He’d been cooped up at Headquarters for way too long.

“Transmitting mission information now. You are to collect the object, then report immediately to HQ. Understand?”

“Yes.” Yabu said, trying not to let the condescending tone of his boss bother him. In truth, he deserved it. He’d managed to lose an agent, and while they’d gotten Yuto back in what had to be record time, it was still an inexcusable mistake. When he’d called to deliver the news of having recovered their agent, his report was met with less than enthusiastic--though obviously, relieved--remarks. None of the higher-ups were pleased with him.

Despite that though, their team had been given a mission. It wasn’t to pursue Hikaru; Yabu had expected for them to be pulled from Hikaru’s case after this, which he had to admit was for the best. He was too close to the situation, and he knew it. No, along with turning over all information about the rogue ex-agent, his team had been given a retrieval mission. He assumed it was a puff piece, told that it should be easy and they were being dispatched simply because they were in the area.

Bowing, Yabu thanked his superiors and bid them farewell. When the call disconnected he let out a long sigh, bringing his hands up to his face as he tried to settle his nerves. Keeping secrets always made him feel sick.

He’d kept quiet about Inoo. He didn’t turn the tech agent in for what he’d done, and in truth he couldn’t even able to wrap his mind around why. It just didn’t feel right. He knew he should have; Inoo Kei had betrayed the trust of the entire team, collaborated with one of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s most wanted, and--though unintentionally--enabled Yuto’s kidnapping. And Yabu was fully aware of all of this, having mulled it over for nearly an hour before calling his superiors, but he still hadn’t been able to do it. Now though, he had a whole new problem ahead of him. What the hell were they supposed to do with Inoo now?

The actions hadn’t been malicious, he tried to tell himself as he left his office. In a roundabout way, it was an action to help the team, stemming from Inoo’s own mistrust of Yabu himself. That had Yabu’s stomach twisting. Inoo had worked with a S.H.I.E.L.D. enemy out of the concern that he was going to hurt his teammates, so despite everything, Yabu felt that really, he had himself to blame.

“New mission assignment.” He reported, walking into the lab. Chinen glanced up from his tablet at the sound of his voice. “Did a transmission from HQ come yet?”

“I don’t know, I haven’t checked.” Chinen responded, getting up to walk over to one of the computers. “I wasn’t expecting any kind of job.”

“I know, everyone needs a break.” Yabu said, stretching his arms up behind his head. “Even to him, his voice sounded weary. His eyes caught on the fresh scabs on Chinen’s knuckles as the little agent began typing, but he didn’t comment on them. “Unfortunately, duty calls. It’s supposed to be short, anyway.”

“Ah, here it is.” After a few clicks of the mouse, Chinen had a mission briefing document pulled up on the screen. “Oh, a retrieval mission.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, as long as it’s not for picking up a terrigen crystal, we should be fine.” Chinen’s eyes flew across the page, reading quickly. Yabu let out a short laugh. “Let’s see… At some old Italian church, by the looks of it. That is closeby, we just now entered Sweden.”

“I’ll call everyone in here.” Yabu said. “Hey, what is it we’re collecting, anyway?”

Yuto felt Keito’s muscles move under his knuckles, enough of a tell to let him duck easily under the half-hearted punch that whistled over his head. He grinned, and Keito grinned back at his smug expression.

“You ready for the mission?” He asked. Keito swallowed.

“I guess.” He said. Yuto could tell he was nervous though, and threw another punch. It couldn’t be counted as a punch though, not really, just nudging Keito’s shoulder.

“It’ll be fine. We’ve done extraction missions a bunch of times, you know how it goes.”

“I guess.” Keito said again. Yuto laughed a little. “But the last extraction mission…”

“But they’ve told us what we’re after this time.” Yuto said quickly. “It’s just some gravitonium. It can’t do anything to your DNA.”

Though Yuto knew this wasn’t news to Keito--they’d sat next to each other during the mission briefing--a little of the tension left his shoulders anyway, and it made Yuto smile. Keito threw his own punch, but like Yuto’s own, it was a gentle nudge to his chest, Keito’s wrapped knuckles touching the fabric of his tank-top.

“Come on though, Keito. Wouldn’t it be cool if I got some powers? Then I could be as cool as you.”

The words had the effect Yuto wanted, the lightest of pink colors flushing across Keito’s face. Just because he wanted to see Keito blush didn’t mean what he said wasn’t true though, swallowing.

“I’m glad I came back so soon.” He said quietly, touching his fist lightly against Keito’s chest again. Keito nodded.

“I… I was so worried about you.”

“Hikaru was kind to me.” Yuto said quickly. “You didn’t need to worry.”

“How was I not going to worry?”

Despite the guilt that came with causing Keito so much stress, knowing he was cared about like that had a small, happy jolt run through his chest.

“I thought about you a lot while I was gone.” Yuto confessed. Keito met his eyes.

“You were only gone for nine hours.” He said. He sounded a little puzzled and slightly amused, hitting Yuto back. Yuto laughed.

“Okay, but…” He smiled a little. “I did think about you.” Yuto reached his hand up, sliding his thumb through Keito’s lax fist and across his palm to hold his hand, wondering if any of his hints are being picked up on. In truth, they were hints he’d been dropping before he even realized it, but then Chinen had pointed out that saying offhand things like that wasn’t the most normal, asking him if he liked Keito, and Yuto found himself saying yes. Putting a label to the way he felt about Keito was helpful, and finding out that his friends were supportive of the idea, if anything were to happen, was nice too.

To his surprise, when he looked up from their hands it was Keito that moved, pressing close to him, his eyes already shut tight. Keito was leaning in, Yuto realized, another happy jolt going through him, and then Keito kissed him, squeezing his hands tightly. He felt so nervous against him, and Yuto found it so cute but he couldn’t help but start smiling, Keito pulling back a little when he felt the smile against his lips. He sent a questioning glance Yuto’s way, but Yuto just shook his head, letting his forehead rest against Keito’s own.

“You’re so cute.” He said, and it was even cuter to watch Keito blush red.

“So… Can we spar in here now, or…?” Came a voice on Yuto’s left, and he realized suddenly that he’d completely forgotten about Daiki and Yamada, the two agents sitting on the floor with expectant expressions. He were supposed to have passed the practice room over to them a good ten minutes ago, which meant they’d probably been watching them for at least that long.

“Y-yeah.” Yuto let his hand drop to his side, smiling a little when Keito continued to hold it. “Let’s go?”

Keito nodded, and Yuto tried his hardest not to skip from the practice room. He was only half successful.

“Well?”

Daiki’s voice was cocky, Yamada looking up at him, bouncing on the balls of his feet and shaking out his wrists.

“Well what?”

“Are you actually going to hit me, or what?”

“Oh, shut up.” Yamada told him, rolling his eyes. “You’re too sweaty, I can’t get a grip on you.”

“My secret weapon.”

Yamada pulled a face, Daiki laughing so hard that he couldn’t dodge, getting hit square in the gut. The punch knocked him down, and Yamada felt bad.

“Sorry.” He extended a hand down, and Daiki dismissed the apology as Yamada pulled him to his feet.

“I deserved that one.” He said. “We should be landing soon, right?”

“Right.” Yamada confirmed, guessing that meant their practice session was coming to a close. “Do we even know what we’re in Australia to get, anyway?”

Daiki shook his head. “The higher-ups won’t tell us, apparently. Something top secret. Probably alien business that we don’t have a high enough clearance level to hear about.”

Yamada nodded a bit, Daiki slinging an arm around his shoulder as they walked to the locker room to change from their sweaty practice clothes. Daiki was gross, but Yamada didn’t really care.

“So we’re grabbing a mystery briefcase and transporting it from the Australian S.H.I.E.L.D. base to our own headquarters without knowing what’s in it? How are we supposed to handle it properly?”

“Well, it’s probably safe, right?” Daiki reasoned. “Otherwise they would tell us.”

“When is alien stuff ever safe?” Yamada asked back, and Daiki laughed. Once they’d reached the base and none of their transmissions were being received though, Yamada began to feel that his joke wasn’t much of a joke anymore.

“We should go in.” He told Yabu, watching the director trying to make contact with the base for the fifth time. “We’re just standing by; they probably need our help in there. There’s no other reason for them not to answer. They knew we were coming.”

Yabu sighed a little bit, nodding. “You’re right. I’ll get Inoo to start bypassing the clearance levels to the mainframe, then request permission to enter--they’re still not supposed to know he can do that. I want everyone ready to go except Takaki; he needs to stay by the plane, since he’s holding the transportation pod on that shiny new motorbike of his. Hand out the comms, will you?”

Yamada nodded, jumping into action. A degree of seriousness settled throughout the plane as they descended onto the base, commlinks in their ears, bulletproof vests strapped to their fronts. Yamada had always found a bulletproof vest more threatening than comforting--it put the idea in his head that there was someone out there looking to shoot him. He glanced across the garage and gave Keito, who he was partnered with for this run, a tiny thumbs up. The sign was returned quickly, and that was good, because the confidence Keito had in their gestures was something Yamada liked to use to gauge how nervous his fellow agent was. He’d looked anxious, but that was also just Keito’s face, Yamada mused.

“Ready?” Came a voice in their ear. It was Yuto, raring to go as always.

“Ready.” The eight responses came in sync, including Yamada’s own, and it made him smile a bit.

They weren’t ready, but not for lack of preparation against the enemy. The problem was that there didn’t seem to be an enemy a all; the base was quiet when they stepped inside. Yamada instantly felt at a loss.

“This is spooky.” Daiki muttered.

“Their security system was still armed.” Inoo reported. “I had to disarm it for you guys. So… There wasn’t a breach, or anything.”

That wasn’t comforting, but that was Inoo. Yamada continued to creep forward, his gun up and ready, Keito walking next to him in an identical position. Yamada peeked his head into a room to their left, finding it empty, Keito doing the same on their right.

“Hey, so… I think I found something.” Keito’s voice was strained with worry, Yamada hurrying to his side, and sure enough, the scene was worrisome--there were about six S.H.I.E.L.D. scientists in the room and all appeared to be knocked out, a briefcase on its side in the middle of the floor. It was laying open, a beautiful blue crystal laying in the middle of it.

“Keito, I think you found what we came for.” Yamada remarked.

“The two of you found it?” Yabu barked, sounding nervous. “Okay. If it’s safe to do so, go ahead and start heading to the dropsite. Daiki and I will come to you.”

Yabu’s apparent apprehension made Yamada a little apprehensive too as they entered the dark lab. Keito tucked his icer away, kneeling for the case just as a black hooded figure flashed past Yamada’s line of vision. He fired at it but missed, tripping over his feet in his surprise, falling into Keito behind him. Keito yelled, throwing out an arm to stop himself, landing fully on the briefcase.

Yamada knew Keito had touched the crystal before he saw the contact because Keito seized up, yelling, a volcanic-rock-looking substance taking over his body as he lay on the floor. Yamada didn’t want to touch him, unsure if that would help or hurt, and as he watched the hooded figure stooped, picking the crystal up from the briefcase and sprinting from the room.

They reached Italy without incident. Daiki landed the plane, turned on the cloaking, and joined the rest of the team in the hangar, where everyone was getting prepared. They hadn’t had a mission like this in a while, and Daiki was excited. Yabu told them in the briefing that the people holding the gravitonium were already on edge--something about either stealing the element, creating it illegally, or just generally not supposed to be having it--and as a result nobody was supposed to know they were coming. So they were all going undercover as curious tourists. Daiki strapped on his thin bulletproof vest first before tugging on a large, slightly garish purple t-shirt. A tan zookeeper’s hat, jeans, and open-toed sandals completed the look, Yuto bursting into laughter when he saw him.

“Shut up.” Daiki said, trying not to giggle. “Why do you get to look so good and I look like… This?”

Yuto’s outfit was quite plain, a dark blue baseball cap pulled down his face and a camera around his neck the only noticeable things about him. Yuto just shrugged, still laughing a little. Daiki made a face at him, turning to Yamada instead. The younger agent was looking unsure of himself, staring down at the icer in his hand before sticking it in his belt.

“You okay?” Daiki asked.

“I… Yeah.”

“What, just surprised?”

“Surprised about what?”

Daiki raised his eyebrows.

“Surprised that Yabu’s letting you go on this one.” He said. Yamada swallowed.

“I mean, I can do this.” Yamada didn’t sound super convincing, but Daiki didn’t press him. “It’s just a retrieval mission. I’ve done a bunch of them.”

“But there’s a crowd out there.” He didn’t want to scare Yamada, but he also didn’t want him pushing himself too hard, or overestimating his abilities; he’d noticed discomfort on the powered agent’s face during the mission briefing, and there were only seven of them in the room then. “Like you said, it’s just a retrieval mission. We don’t need every man on this one. And Chinen might need help, he’s in there running the comms and cameras all by himself.”

Yamada pursed his lips, and Daiki realized a second later how patronizing he might sound. That wasn’t his intention, and thankfully Yamada didn’t look offended.

“No, I want to do this.” He said. “I want to be able to do this.”

“I’ll be next to you the whole time, alright?”

Yamada gave him a smile.

“Thank you.” He said. “If… If it’s not too much trouble…” Yamada looked hesitant with his request, so Daiki gave him what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

“What?”

“If you ever notice me looking nervous, if you could just try to calm your mind and then just touch my arm or something… That would really help.”

Daiki closed his eyes, thinking back to the week of yoga classes they’d had to take as agents in training. It had been forever, but he found it still helped a little, feeling calmer when he reached over and touched Yamada’s arm. Yamada gave him a confused look.

“You look nervous.” Daiki explained, and Yamada smiled a little.

“Thanks.”

They left the plane together but came upon the old church separately, and from all different directions. Keito got there first, mumbling some Italian under his breath, but Daiki had absolutely no idea what he was saying so he didn’t pay attention. Keito and Takaki were going up to a few of the nuns, or pastors, or whoever they could find and explaining that he was a translator with a Japanese tour guide, asking for permission to lead a tour throughout the church. And apparently his Italian wasn’t as rusty as he was worried about, because a few minutes later Daiki heard a whispered “It’s a go. Start walking over.”

They all approach the church, acting as though they didn’t know each other. Takaki waved them all together into a group, Daiki putting on an excited tourist persona, looking up at the large, old building with a mock sense of wonder. He’d seen plenty of interesting structures and artifacts, and this one wasn’t too special.

“On the left we have… I don’t know. Do I really have to make stuff up?” Takaki asked them. The people around were sending glances their way, but thankfully their tourist act was convincing enough for the looks not to linger. Yuto raised his hand as though he had a question, Takaki following through and pretending to call on him.

“Dazzle us with your knowledge of Italian Catholic artifacts.”

“Shut up.” Takaki answered. “Chinen, how’s that diversion coming? We’re about seven minutes from the basement.”

“Almost ready.”

At that news, Daiki rolled his shoulders, his face set. It was almost go time. They continued walking, Takaki gesturing to a painting on his right and telling them what he’d eaten for lunch.

“Three… Two… One.”

As soon as Chinen’s countdown ended, a security alarm began to blare. That was their cue, Daiki making a quick walk for the basement door that was a hallway and a half down, Yamada, Keito, Yuto, and Yabu on his heels as Takaki turned the other way, headed to change his outfit and get his motorcycle.

The basement was empty when they got down into it. They hadn’t expected a large deserted room, and Daiki immediately began to feel nervous, this situation too familiar.

“Chinen, it’s empty down here. Where are they?” Yabu asked.

“Hold on, I’m double checking the cameras.” The security alarm continued to scream overhead for a few moments before falling silent. “None of the people we’re looking for are shown to have left the church. They should be down there.”

“We might as well look around, then.” Yuto said, striding forward. That was a reasonable course of action, without a doubt; the basement was full of shelves and boxes, piled high with knickknacks. They didn’t get very far though, each elbow-deep in their own pile of religious memorabilia when the basement door slammed open. A rugged, bearded man was standing there, a spherical object sitting in his palm. He had a rather large gun in his other hand, but the weapon was down by his side.

_“Stai cercando per questo?”_

The cracking sound of Takaki’s knuckles echoed in the cold and empty air. He didn’t want to sit here any longer, but was ordered to wait at the dropsite for with his motorcycle, so that’s what he was going to do. It was difficult though, because from what he could tell the mission was going to utter shit inside the Australian compound. All of the voices on the commlinks sounded panicked; something bad has happened to Keito, and someone--maybe multiple someones--was in possession of whatever it was they were supposed to be retrieving. Yamada was in pursuit, but so were Yabu and Daiki, all sounding like they were somehow simultaneously chasing the exact same person in different directions throughout the base.

“I’m coming your way, Takaki!” Daiki yelled, Yamada’s voice overlaying with a similar message.

“The guy I was chasing disappeared.” Yabu reported. “I’ll meet up with the two of you. Yuto?”

“I’m with Keito. There’s something wrong with him.” Yuto sounded scared, which was always a warning sign. “I’m going to help him to the plane.”

“Good.”

And then Takaki saw them. Only their silhouettes were visible from the outside lights on the compound, but it wasn’t hard to tell who was who; Daiki was the first team member to emerge, his adversary cloaked and hooded and turning on his heel to stand his ground. They sparred as Takaki watched, but Daiki was on the defensive, blocking a few punches and kicks before pulling out his icer. He fired, the dendrotoxin leaving the gun in a flash and hitting its mark. Instead of falling to the ground though, the man disappeared.

“What the--?” Takaki began, but then Yabu and Yamada were appearing, and the man they were chasing this time had a crystal in his hand. That was it, Takaki supposed, revving up his bike. If the object wasn’t coming to him, then he was going to it.

Yamada, Yabu, and Daiki had the man surrounded on all sides and Takaki was coming up from the back, the man turning to look when he heard the motorcycle approaching. He tried to jump out of the way but Takaki didn’t let him, swerving, and the collision was surprisingly solid; the bike dipped and fell to its side, Takaki bailing to avoid getting injured. The crystal flew through the air, Yamada shouting, catching it just before it hit the ground.

The man they’d been chasing was laying flat on his back, gasping for breath. Yabu was staring down at him, looking shocked, and Takaki had a sudden, horrifying thought that maybe he’d dealt mortal damage.

“Ryosuke!” Daiki shouted and stepped forward, just as Yabu grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

“Don’t.” His voice was low and warning, and when Takaki looked at Yamada he saw why. Yamada’s eyes were blown wide in panic, but his face was the only part of him that was visible; he’d frozen in his stooped position, and while the crystal was still gripped tightly in his hand, his entire body was turning to stone, a crumbling black rock. Then it overtook his face, Takaki stumbling away on his hands and feet.

“Is he…?”

His question went unanswered as the man they’d been chasing began sitting up, his arm folded over his ribs. Yabu opened his mouth to say something, but he looked so shaken up and thrown off balance that no words made it past his lips.

“Don’t touch me, Kota.” The words were growled breathlessly by the cloaked figure, and the next second the man was on his feet, running into the forest on the outskirts of the base. Takaki knew they wouldn’t be able to find him in the wood, but he wasn’t concerned with the man at all; Yamada’s black casing was beginning to crack, and Takaki didn’t know what to expect.

“Yabu!” Came a shout, Takaki hearing it in real life before heard it over his commlink, turning in the direction of the noise. It was Yuto, Keito’s arm slung over his shoulder, the weakened agent looking like pure hell and barely moving his legs. “Help!”

Yabu ran over, Takaki looking back to Yamada. Parts of the rock were beginning to fall off of him in chunks, and as soon as his legs were free Yamada’s body pitched forwards and onto the dirt ground, his eyes closed.

“What are Yamada’s vitals?” Daiki asked over the commlink.

“His heartbeat is rapid but not life threatening.” Chinen reported. “No sensory input though. What the hell just happened?”

Takaki didn’t know what to say.

Keito didn’t even realize that he was the only one that understood what the bearded man just said to them.

_“Stai cercando per questo?”_ He repeated. _Are you looking for this?_

He was holding a small, red and grey object in his hand, and Keito has the feeling that yes, he had exactly what they were here for. The man pressed a button, and a high-pitched sound began ringing from the communication device in his ear, shrill and so painful that Keito had to rip it from his ear. A few of his teammates yelled from behind them, a clatter of comms falling to the floor. The man grinned. His teeth were yellowed.

A door behind them burst open, one that had been blocked by cardboard boxes, and a number of men with guns ran out. The distraction of the ear-piercing commlinks had Keito so disarmed that he couldn’t draw his gun quick enough, but it may not have mattered either way; they were now outnumbered, and the men around them had real guns, shiny black handguns pointed at their heads.

Keito’s balance shifted. He wheeled his arms but it didn’t help, only able to throw up his arms them up to shield his head before his upper back and shoulders hit the ceiling. He blinked in surprise, groaning in pain, glancing over to see his friends also flat against the ceiling. Then he felt gravity shift again, his legs aching as his body hit the stone floor.

Inoo reclined onto his bed, figuring that in the very least, now that the plane had come to a stop, he could take a nap. He’d been bored out of his mind for the past few hours, and with no ending of his solitary confinement in sight, sleep seemed like the best option this that point. They’d been headed toward HQ a few hours ago, but Inoo had felt the plane turn, and figured that they must have gotten some kind of mission, because now they’d landed. He had no idea where they were or why, but for some reason, Yabu hadn’t turned him in. The higher-ups didn’t know what he’d done, and for that Inoo was grateful.

He was about to drift off when he heard a fumbling with the lock on his door. He sat up, stock still, nervous and surprised and unsure of what to do. Then Chinen burst in, his eyes wide and scared.

“I need help.”

“Are… Are you sure you need _my_ help?”

“Listen. It’s just you and me on this plane right now, and all of the comms and video has been cut out. I’m trying to run this mission deaf and blind.”

Inoo swallowed, getting to his feet. He’d been there before, and nothing was scarier than the comms being knocked out. He nodded, following Chinen to the lab at a run, Chinen briefing him on the current mission as they went.

“I’m trying, but… All of this tech stuff is hard.” Chinen’s voice was thick with frustration. The one thing Chinen hated more than not knowing something was not being able to succeed at it.

“Well, it’s not your area.” Inoo told him, sitting down at the computer running the mission. He unmuted the audio, getting back a piercing buzz that made him jump, turning the sound off again.

“The comms aren’t knocked out.” He reported, opening up the plane’s transmitting center. “Whoever they’re up against is overriding them with their own transmission, and it’s screwing with all of the feeds to this plane, including the video.”

“How to we fix it?”

“We do the same thing that they’re doing to us.” Inoo quickly rerouted all of the transmitters, directing them at the old church. “None of our agents have any of their comms in still, do they?”

Chinen just sent him a look that made Inoo realize how stupid his question was.

“Oh, right. You have no way of knowing. Well, here’s to hoping they don’t.” Inoo pressed a button, beginning the transmission from the plane. “I’d hate to be the cause of any permanent hearing loss.”

He figured a few minutes would be enough to do the trick, and once two and a half of those minutes passed he cutted the pulse out. Like a charm, there was nothing blocking the comms or cameras anymore, reconnecting and hacking in easily. The video feed pooped up first, but the only visible member of the team was Takaki, standing in the church parking lot next to his motorcycle and pretending to talk on the phone.

The comms came back online next, and it was immediately obvious that the devices weren’t in the agents’ ears like they were supposed to be. Inoo sighed in relief, turning up the audio he and Chinen could still hear what was going on.

“I’ll check their vitals.” Chinen started to say, frozen by a growling voice.

_“Tu sei il problema.”_

_“You are the problem.”_

A whole lot of weird had been happening, but Keito couldn’t be bothered to try and make sense of it yet, simply trying to keep on his feet and stay conscious. He was unsuccessful in about three seconds, the bearded man with the red device twisting his hand, Keito skidding backwards and slamming painfully into a shelving unit full of candlesticks and crucifixes. Thankfully, Yabu had grabbed Daiki, the shorter agent’s unconscious body falling about in the shifting gravitation, bleeding from the side of his head.

Many of their opponents were also unconscious--at least, unconscious was what Keito hoped. For all he knew, they could be dead; many of them were passed out with burst electronical devices in their ears, blood seeping out from around the black boxes. Keito had no idea what had caused it, but he had to assume it was Chinen from the plane. Two of the men had been unaffected, and Keito had taken their shock at what was happening to their comrades to knock the both of them out, punching one in the chest so hard that he’d heard a crunch, that man slamming into the second one and hitting both of them into the wall. They weren’t moving.

Their leader was looking at Keito now with malice; gravity shifted again and Keito hit the wall on the opposite side of the room, groaning. He was on the same side of the room as the bearded man, who began to chuckle.

“You are very strong.” He was talking in English now, heavily accented English. “But not so strong you can fight gravity. That’s my power now.” He glanced down at the sphere in his hand. The gravitonium. “You may be a nuisance, but you are defenseless against me.”

The man raised his arm, and the large gun was now pointed at Keito’s head.

“No!” Yuto yelled. The shout surprised all of them, Keito realizing a split second later that that may have been the point, because then the man’s aim was thrown off, blowing a chunk out of the concrete wall beside Keito’s head. He growled at his failure, readjusting his aim and firing, a figure jumping in front of Keito just before the trigger went off.

Keito saw the man’s body lurch as he took the bullet, the force of the impact knocking his hood off and it was Hikaru, pressed against the wall next to him.

“Well?” Hikaru gasped out, Keito too astonished to do much more than stare. “Go punch him!”

That helped shake off some of the shock, Keito kicking off the wall and jumping into action. He overestimated his leap but all that did was put himself and the bearded man into a headlong collision, Keito punching every inch of him he could reach. It was the hit to the jaw that did it and Keito could tell, a resounding crack snapping the man’s head to the side as his eyes fluttered shut. Gravity instantly rights itself again, the rest of his team groaning as they slide down the walls and onto the floor.

“Are you okay?” Yuto asked, running over, hesitant to touch him in case of injuries. Keito nodded, but it wasn’t him he was thinking about, looking over at Hikaru. The Inhuman was slumped against the wall behind him, his hands pressed to his side. His eyes were closed, his breathing extremely labored. Keito heard a kind of strangled sob from his right and it’s Yabu; he’d left Daiki’s body with Yamada and was running to Hikaru, a few curses coming from his mouth. Then Keito noticed something. No blood.

“You idiot--!” Yabu began, but Hikaru held up a hand.

“Kota, Kota. I’m okay.” Hikaru unzipped his jacket, revealing a bulletproof vest, a deep indent made where the bullet had hit his chest. “It just knocked the wind out of me, that’s all.”

“I. Thought. You. Were. Dying. You. Damn--” Yabu punctuated each word with a punch, Hikaru simply smiling at him. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Saving you guys, by the looks of things.”

That wasn’t really an answer but Yabu didn’t try pressing Hikaru for an actual one, just reaching over and pulling Hikaru in for a hug.


	6. Aftershocks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now that Hikaru is on the plane and Inoo is out of confinement, there are a lot of things staying quiet that are begging to be said. Unfortunately, the uncomfortable silences aren't broken until an extraction mission rendering a concerning object is brought aboard.

“And you've got the retrieval coordinates?” Yabu walked quickly from the shiny Headquarters doors, pressing his phone to his ear with his shoulder. Two black cars were waiting for him in the parking lot, seeing Takaki offer up a peace sign from the front of one, while Daiki pressed his face to the driver side window in the other. Yabu waved at him.

“One sec... Got ‘em. Though... By the looks of it, there's no point in you guys coming back to the quinjet.”

“What?” Yabu frowned, coming to a stop in front of the car. Daiki opened the door for him, but he didn’t get in. There was the sound of typing, then Inoo spoke again.

“You'd probably get there faster on wheels than through the air. And there aren't many places to land near the area, either; it'd probably be better overall to just drive.”

“We need to get the jet out of the HQ base though.” Yabu argued, feeling the need to drop his voice a bit. “As soon as we can.”

“Trust me, I get it.” Inoo fell silent again, obviously thinking. “Just... We'll get into the air and get it somewhere close to where you all are going. I already transmitted the coordinates to both cars, so go ahead to the retrieval site and we'll let you know where we end up. Yuto and Chinen are more than capable of holding down the fort until you finish up.”

Yabu knew Inoo was right, but he still felt uneasy as he hung up, stepping up and sitting in the driver's seat. The feeling was nothing new, unfortunately; he felt as though he'd been uneasy for weeks, when in reality it had really only been a day or two.

Hikaru had come back with them from Italy. In the midst of everything else, the team had forgotten about the tracker on their plane, so Hikaru had followed them to the church easily, and it was lucky he had. He wasn’t there because he knew about the mission, he told them later, saying he'd given thought to what Yabu had told him about joining the possibly team.

“If S.H.I.E.L.D. are after powered people, I’d be able to help more of them.” He’d said, “Though… I realize what kind of a position this puts you in. I’m sorry.”

It was ironic, Yabu felt, how aggressively S.H.I.E.L.D. were looking for Hikaru, when in truth he was sitting in the bay of their organization-issued quinjet. And he would have found it funnier if he hadn’t just lied through his teeth to his superiors for the second time in a row. He felt a bit better about this secret than the one he was keeping about Inoo, but--and the whole team agreed--letting Hikaru work out his method for approaching HQ would give him a better chance than throwing him to the wolves. Under Yuto’s supervision, of course.

The meeting that took them to that conclusion brought with it the discussion about what to do with Inoo. Yabu knew it was something they needed to talk about, but he’d been trying to avoid as long as possible because it was something he hated to think about. When they’d returned to the plane with Hikaru in tow and found Inoo with Chinen in the lab though, he knew it needed to happen. So they’d talked. It was agreed on that they needed Inoo, something evident after the mission they’d just completed, and they couldn’t keep him locked up. So Inoo was freed.

Sort of. Inoo was under Chinen’s custody. Himself and his actions needed to be visible to Chinen at all times until he was fully trusted again, though no one knew when that would be. Chinen was the best person for this, Yabu supposed, because they were constantly together and running away from Chinen would be literally impossible. Thankfully, Chinen had agreed.

“So, what exactly are we doing?” Takaki asked once they all had their comms in. Yabu suppressed a sigh.

“We’re going on a bit of a drive.” He told them. “Delivering the Gravitonium put us back in the green; we’ve been dispatched. The coordinates have been delivered to your car already.”

“We’re closeby.” Yamada remarked, and Yabu nodded.

“That’s why we’re driving.” He said. They were broken up into two cars. Keito and Takaki were in one, Takaki behind the wheel. Yabu was in the second one,with Yamada and Daiki, putting himself in charge of watching both of them, though it was mostly Daiki he was worried about, the little fireball of an agent still in recovery from being knocked out against the ceiling of the Italian church. Yabu started up the car.

“What is it that we’re after?” Keito asked.

“Don’t worry, it’s not dangerous.” Yabu said quickly.

“More weird alien stuff?” Daiki asked.

“Weird?” Yabu didn’t look at him. “No, not weird. It’ll be fine.”

The lab was quiet. Aside for the buzzing of the electronics or the click or two from Inoo’s nails against the screen of his tablet, silence permeated throughout the room. And Chinen was going crazy.

He told himself his upset restlessness was because of the silence, but in truth he wasn’t sure. He’d had this bizarre hope that when Inoo was out of his solitary confinement, things would just go back to normal, as though nothing had happened at all. The first few moments of being with Inoo again had felt normal, in the emergency state when Chinen needed his help in the Gravitonium mission. Inoo was on the comms and video feed and he himself was on the team’s vitals, making sure everyone got out alive. But not now. Now it was formal and silent and awkward and Inoo was sitting there, looking completely unbothered, so Chinen kept his emotions off of his face and did the same. They were supposed to be professional, after all. Inoo’s demeanor wasn’t insulting, or angering him in any way; it just put a small, sad twinge in his chest that he was trying to shove down. There was a lack of familiarity and a thick discomfort in the air, despite all of the years they had worked together. That was what hurt.

“Where are Yuto and HIkaru?” Inoo asked, breaking the silence. He didn’t look up from his tablet though.

“The cockpit?” Chinen guessed, turning to the plane’s security cameras to look. Yuto was supposed to be steering the plane. “We’re going to land soon.”

He was right, and after getting a confirmation Inoo simply nodded. The plane landed smoothly, and after sending the rest of the team their location, all there was to do was wait for the mission to end so they could leave again. And usually Chinen liked all of this, liked watching the mission unfold and doing what he could to help. This time he couldn’t wait for this to be over.

“We’ll let you know when we get to the retrieval site.” Daiki said, his voice piping up in over the radios.

“We’ll be watching.” Inoo responded, and Chinen resisted the urge to begin pacing. He checked the security feed on the plane again, hoping that at least Hikaru and Yuto were doing something interesting, but they were just sitting around in the break room, talking. So he checked vitals again before switching to Takaki’s body camera, watching his fellow agent’s hands on the wheel as the car turned down a forest path.

“Hey, Yabu never said what it was we’re after.” Inoo remarked after the longest three minutes of Chinen’s life.”Do you think he knows what it is?”

“He’ll have been told enough.” Chinen responded with a shrug. “It probably isn’t anything we can’t handle at this point.”

The following pause was so quiet that Chinen heart Inoo swallow.

“This plane does have a good team on it.” Inoo concluded with a nod. He spoke in present tense, not past, which meant something, but there was a degree of separation in his voice that meant something else. Chinen opened his mouth to speak, biting his tongue when Takaki’s voice came over the comms.

“This is happening way too damn often.”

“What?” Chinen asked him, Inoo switching quickly through the body cameras. There was nothing wrong though, from what they could see; all that was around the team was trees.

“We’re here, but nothing else is.”

“Wait, you’re at the retrieval site?” Chinen asked. He clicked back to their original mission statement and frowned. Something didn’t look right. “Tell me those coordinates again.”

Takaki did, and Chinen’s hunch was confirmed.

“The coordinates have changed.” He said with a sigh. “What the hell--”

“Daiki? Yabu?” The voice that cut him off was Yamada’s, extremely small and panicked. “Where… What?”

“Yamada?” Chinen asked back. “Are you okay?”

“Keito!” Yamada yelled.

“Get me either Daiki or Yabu’s body cameras, they were in the car with Yamada, they’ll probably…” Chinen trailed off when he realized that Inoo wasn’t listening. Inoo wasn’t even there; the lab was empty except for him. But Chinen knew he hadn’t heard Inoo leave, a quick flip through the plane’s cameras letting him know that he was right. Inoo hadn’t left, but he wasn’t here, either.

“Takaki? Daiki? Keito?”

“Chinen?” It was Keito’s voice; he sounded as terrified as Yamada did. “I’m here, and Yamada’s here, but… Nobody else is. Even the cars are gone. They all disappeared.”

“Yeah, Inoo’s gone too. And there’s still nothing at the retrieval site?” Chinen shifted his view to Keito’s body camera, and saw Yamada standing next to him. “Just stay there, hold on, and… I’ll try to contact the others.”

But the comms didn’t even reach the other agents. It was like their communication system was down, but he knew for a fact that it wasn’t. He turned to the mission statement, checking it again. And as he watched, the coordinates for the retrieval point shifted. The lab door opened.

“What’s going on?”

Chinen turned. It was Hikaru, striding in and looking confused.

“Yuto?” Chinen asked back.

“I stood, turned, and he was gone. I thought that was weird, but I was hoping he was with you.”

“He’s not. And Inoo’s gone too.”

Hikaru pulled up a stool, walking over to sit next to Chinen, who was still watching the coordinates. They were shifting continuously now, the numbers turning slowly. Chinen grabbed a pen and paper, beginning to write them down.

“You two still alright?” He asked quickly. Thankfully, Yamada and Keito both answered affirmatively; they sounded a little calmer now.

“What are you doing?” Hikaru asked. Chinen ignored him though, staring down at the numbers. There had to be something. This had to make sense. And finally, it clicked.

“We’re after a person.”

“...what?” Hikaru asked. “What is that?”

“The coordinates we were given are being sent to us through some sort of a GPS, not a set location. And they’re moving, moving southwest a little over six kilometers per hour, which is--.”

“--a kilometer and a half faster than the average walking speed.” Hikaru finished. Chinen nodded.

“Which is why the retrieval site is empty. It changed when we arrived.”

“They’re running away.” Hikaru said quietly.

“Our extraction object running away, and nearly the whole team is missing. It’s just me, you, Yamada, and… And Keito.” Chinen could tell he and Hikaru had the realization at the same time. “The Inhumans.”

Chinen pushed the mic button harder than he needed to, asking quickly.

“Do either of you have a pair of those handcuffs that I made?”

Silence. Then,

“Yeah.” Keito said. “I do.”

“Good, good. So… You’re after an Inhuman, and whatever power they have is what’s made the rest of us--the members of our team that aren’t powered people--disappear like this. So we need to get those handcuffs on them, and then we’ll figure out how to get everybody else back. Alright?”

“Alright.” Neither of the agents had much confidence in their voice, but Chinen didn’t comment on it.

“You need to start heading southwest. At a bit of a jog--this person is walking quickly. I’ll let you guys know if they change their path or when you get close.”

Chinen pulled his phone from his pocket as Yamada and Keito set off, dialing Yuto’s number.

“S.H.I.E.L.D. sent you all to extract an Inhuman. What are they going to do with an Inhuman, going after him like this? How did they find them?”

“I’m guessing they’re messing things up, messing things up at least enough to get on the radar.” Chinen held his phone up to his ear, listening to it ring. At least it was ringing. “So they’re going into a containment module on the plane, and we’re transporting them to HQ for a psychological evaluation and a check on their powers, how control they are, and what they’ve been using them for.”

“And how they can be weaponized.” Hikaru grumbled, but Chinen didn’t say anything because he’d reached Yuto’s voicemail, sighing and hanging up.

“I have eyes on him!” Came a voice. It was Keito. “It’s a young kid--though I think he’s taller than Yamada. He’s running; he keeps waving his hand at us.”

“I don’t think his powers work on Inhumans, whatever it is he can do.” Chinen told him. “I wouldn’t worry too much, just cuff him so we can get our team back.”

He and Hikaru watched it unfold on Keito’s body camera. Confusion slowed the boy’s feet enough for Yamada to speed up and circle around him, and after that it was easy for Keito to get him in cuffs. He did look surprisingly young, and the thought of turning his wide-eyed, fear-stricken face in to Headquarters without a clear explanation of what would happen to him made Chinen frown. He pushed the feeling away though, watching Keito put the cuffs around his wrist.

Hikaru suddenly yelled, toppling the stool he was sitting on and crashing to the floor. The noise made Chinen jump horribly, and there was a curse next to them.

“Hikaru, what the--?”

It was Inoo, also looking quite startled, looking at him in shock. “When the hell did you get in here?”

“Where have you been?” Hikaru asked him back, his voice still loud in surprise.

“I’ve been here the whole time. The team just got to the extraction site, and--” Inoo turned to the screens, seeing Yamada and the Inhuman. He blinked, then looked at the tablet in his hands. “How is it already twenty minutes after three? I just…”

He turned to Chinen, looking for answers, and Chinen understood instantly why this boy needed so urgently to be apprehended.

“Time.” He sighed out, bending down to help Hikaru to his feet. “He can manipulate time.”

“His name is Matsushima Sou.” Yamada reported. “He’s nineteen years old.”

“Go ahead and bring him to the cars. They should be back by now.” Chinen said, and then his phone began to ring. It was Yuto.

“Hey.” Yuto said once he picked up. “My phone says I have a missed call from you, but it never rang. Is Hikaru with you?”

“Yeah, he’s in the lab. You should get in here too.”

“So now what? Do we just wait?” Hikaru asked. They’d just landed the plane, retreating from the cockpit to the break room for a more comfortable place to relax. Yuto nodded a little, watching as Hikaru nodded back and walked over to the couch, sitting down. Chinen and Inoo were in the lab, and the rest of the team were out on a retrieval mission. Yuto had a lot he wanted to say to Hikaru, and he knew that this moment was the opportunity he’d been looking for, but now that it was here, he wasn’t sure how to begin. He sat down next to Hikaru on the sofa, who gave him a surprised look.

“I know you’re supposed to be supervising me, but you don’t need to supervise me this closely.” Hikaru told him. Yuto waved his hands a bit in apology.

“No, I…”

“Oh, sorry.” Hikaru gave him a slightly shrewd look. “You just looked uncomfortable, is all.” He paused. “You still look uncomfortable."

Yuto decided maybe he should scoot away, just a little.

“What is it?” Hikaru asked him. “Is there something I should be worried about?”

“No, it’s nothing like that. I wanted to talk to you.”

“What about?”

Hikaru's voice was casual, and for the most part the rest of him was too, but Yuto had been extensively trained in the reading of body language, and he spotted a few key muscles tensing up apprehensively, as though Hikaru was bracing himself for something. That made sense though; the last time they’d talked together one-on-one, Hikaru had shackled him to a chair in some cabin in the woods.

“I wanted to thank you.”

The tension drained instantly from Hikaru’s face.

“Thank me?” He asked, surprised. Yuto nodded.

“Yeah. Thank you for… For saving Keito the way you did. If you hadn’t jumped in there, he would have been shot in the head, I’m sure of it. And you risked your life, so… Thank you so much.”

“It’s all in a day’s work.” Hikaru said, and while he was speaking rather flippantly, his face was genuine. “I mean, all of you were pinned to the wall, I couldn’t just watch. It took me a few moments to figure out what was going on; gravitonium is still a myth in the widespread science world, after all.”

“How did you keep if from affecting you?” Yuto asked. A few of the teammates had been wondering that same thing, and ‘a few’ was mostly Takaki, who didn’t want to ask.

“I’ve made a few small transportation devices; they helped me out a lot when I was on the run. I have these shoes that help me take really wide strides or jump high--I can’t fly, I’m too heavy, but it’s close--by funneling highly concentrated jets of air. I was able to use them to counteract the gravity enough to catapult myself in the right direction.”

Yuto nodded a little, falling silent. The skateboard of Hikaru’s Inoo had dissected employed much of the same technology, so that made sense.

“Do you think you could do that to Takaki’s motorcycle?” He asked. It was more of a joke than a serious request, and Hikaru laughed.

“No harm in trying.” He said, and Yuto shook his head a little, laughing himself.

“I don’t know, I think Takaki is in love with his motorcycle. He doesn’t like anyone else touching it. Yamada’s the only person allowed in the garage without clearing the reason with him because he’s got a garden in there.”

“A garden?” Hikaru asked. “On a plane?”

Yuto nodded. “It’s a bit of a zen, coping mechanism thing for him.” He explained. That’s what he’d assumed about it, anyway; he’d never asked. He didn’t really want to. “This ‘feeling emotions’ thing really affects him a lot.”

“Does Keito have any coping mechanisms?” Hikaru asked. Yuto frowned for a moment, thinking.

“I don’t think so. But Keito’s powers aren’t ‘on’ all the time, so to speak, so… It’s not really the same.” He said. “He’s been trying really hard to control himself. I’ve told him that he’s putting too much pressure on himself, but he’s insisting. He doesn’t want to accidentally hurt anyone.”

Yuto knew that the ‘anyone’ Keito kept mentioning was him more often than not, because of Keito’s first training day, when he’d punched the wind out of Yuto and sent him sprawling backwards. It didn’t matter how many times Yuto explained that he’d let himself get hit; Keito had seen the bruise on his torso the next day and nearly started crying.

“He’s too soft for all of this. Having so much strength in his body. He likes that our team is more stealth and retrieval than offense. He likes that we use tranquilizers instead of bullets. His powers make him feel dangerous.” Yuto reached into his pocket for his phone, clicking the volume buttons a few times just to give his fingers something to do. “It makes him feel…” Yuto resisted the word monster, getting to his feet to pace. “He’s worried he’ll do something he regrets.”

“Do you think that if Yabu hadn’t pushed Keito to get back out there, he would be working through his abilities with a healthier mindset?” HIkaru asked. The question was asked innocently, but the implications behind it made Yuto’s throat suddenly feel much drier than it had a second ago.

“Yabu didn’t push him, really.” He began. “Keito just…”

He turned back to the couch, his voice dying in his throat. He was alone. Hikaru, who had asked him a question just a few seconds ago, was nowhere to be seen. His phone buzzed in his hand, looking down at it.

_1 Missed Call: Chinen Yuri_

“Chinen called me?” He muttered to himself. His phone hadn’t gone off at all, in his pocket or his hand, and he knew for a fact it wasn’t on silent. Chinen hadn’t left a message, so Yuto simply called him back.

“Yuto?” Chinen asked when he answered.

“Hey. My phone says I have a missed call from you, but it never rang.” Yuto looked around the empty break room again. “Is Hikaru with you?”

Chinen sighed a little, and he sounded slightly exasperated.

“Yeah, he’s in the lab. You should get in here too.”

Takaki had mulled over Chinen’s explanation of the events in the field three times now, but it wasn’t making any more sense than it had the first time. He hadn’t seen any sort of “time manipulation”, as the scientist had put it. Sure, Keito had somehow managed to make it to the other side of the car, with Yamada and a cuffed kid next to him--their acquisition, he learned. He’d just assumed that the kid had been in the trees, and while Takaki was assessing the situation too early, Keito had spotted and grabbed him.

Not according to Chinen though. According to Chinen, the person was an Inhuman. That wasn’t the part Takaki doubted; that was easy enough to swallow. Chinen and Hikaru were both claiming that this Inhuman could distort time on all non-powered people, that they’d disappeared from each other’s realities because they no longer existed on each other’s timelines, and that the handcuffs he’d made had reconciled all of the time and zapped them back together again.

Sure, he finally decided. No matter how many times he came in contact with things like time travel and alternate universes, they’d never made sense. He’d given up on the alien stuff a long while ago; what was one more thing he didn’t understand?

“Kota, he is a child.” Hikaru, said, interrupting Takaki’s train of thought. His voice wasn’t loud, but it was his tone that caught Takaki’s attention. He sounded about as serious as a heart attack, and a little angry. “We can’t hand him over to S.H.I.E.L.D. Have you seen him? How scared he looks?”

They were all in the conference room, for the debrief after the mission. The main reason for it was Chinen and Hikaru’s explanation, but the conversation had shifted to the Inhuman, and what they were to do with him now.

“He’s just been taken into the custody of the Japanese government for possessing the ability to control time.” Yabu said, his voice incredibly deadpan considering the ludicrous phrase that had just left his mouth. “Of course he looks scared. We’ve explained that no harm will come to him.”

“But you can’t promise him that. You don’t have a high enough clearance level.” Hikaru’s voice had a hint of vindictive sarcasm. Takaki’s eyes flicked to Yamada, who had just shifted in his seat. The shorter agent’s lips were pursed, his arms folded over the tabletop, gripping his wrists tightly with his opposite hands. “I don’t want to just hand him over so he can be turned into a weapon.”

The other Inhumans in the room were beginning to look uncomfortable too, though Takaki knew it probably had less to do with the emotions in the room like in Yamada’s case, and more the words the emotions were put behind.

“Well we have to, because I already told S.H.I.E.L.D. that he’s here.” Yabu said. “They know we have him, and that he’s secure and unharmed. Which they were very pleased to hear, by the way.”

“Yabu, the American government is rounding up Inhumans and _killing_ them.” Hikaru said angrily, and Yamada pushed his chair back, getting to his feet and apologizing quietly before rushing from the room. Takaki wondered briefly if he should follow after him, a thought that many more of them had, Keito even lifting slightly out of his seat, but the meeting still wasn’t over.

“But that’s not S.H.I.E.L.D.” Yabu responded, just as seriously. “S.H.I.E.L.D. are trying to find the murderer and stop him. Hikaru, the worst that’s going to happen to this kid is a psych eval and some time in confinement.”

“And you don’t see anything wrong with that?” Hikaru asked, his voice pale with disbelief. Then his eyes hardened. “Fine. You can hand him in, but I’m going with him.”

“Hikaru--” Yabu started, his voice loud, before cutting himself off. “...can we go and talk, please?”

Hikaru considered the request for a few moments before consenting, following Yabu out the door. The silence behind them didn’t last long, a bit of chattering permeating the room as many people left, Takaki spotting Daiki, Keito, and Yuto all heading in the direction of the garage. Takaki got to his feet as Chinen walked out the door, realizing after a moment that it was only himself and Inoo left in the conference room, and that Inoo hadn’t made a single move to get up.

“Are you… Are you alright?” Takaki asked. Inoo’s head shot up at the question, surprise on his face. If it was surprise that anyone was left in the room or surprise that he was being spoken to, Takaki couldn’t tell. Neither would surprise him; he himself hadn’t made an effort to talk to Inoo much since he’d been revealed as the mole inside their team. He was afraid of how weird it would be.

“Me? Nah.” Inoo responded, his tone as nonchalant as ever, and somehow it wasn’t weird at all. Takaki sat back down. “This is all a bit of a trainwreck, isn’t it?”

Though he sounded amused, Takaki could feel that it was a dry sort of amusement, and he nodded.

“Only a little.” He admitted. “What do you think?”

“About what?”

“Everything?”

Inoo raised an eyebrow at Takaki, who offered a small smile back. Inoo sighed and stretched.

“Well, obviously, I can see both sides.” He said. “S.H.I.E.L.D. has been pushing a pro-Inhuman initiative since the terrigen outbreak, and while it leave a lot to be desired, it’s a start. Though we still don’t know entirely what their motives are. And we know that, but Hikaru doesn’t. We’ve got ‘intervention’ and ‘enforcement’ in our name after all, and S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn’t always this open and sheltering. I mean, we’re nothing compared to Hydra, but still.” He pursed his lips. “I just want to do what’s right by our teammates. All of us do, all at once, and since we all have a different opinion of what ‘right’ is, that makes it near impossible.”

“So… So hold on.” Takaki was struck with a thought. “You were in training at the same time that Yabu and Hikaru were, right?”

“You were too, for a little while.” Inoo told him. “They were moved to a separate complex though.”

“Okay, but before that…” Takaki realized why, probably, that Yabu and Hikaru had been moved. “How much of this is being influenced by _that_ incident?”

“What, Yabu shooting his teammate?” Inoo asked, raising his second eyebrow now. Takaki swallowed.

“Yeah, that.”

“Probably most of Hikaru’s feelings, at least.” Inoo stretched lazily in his chair before getting to his feet. “Especially with Yabu being the face of S.H.I.E.L.D. in Hikaru’s eyes. Which is part of why Hikaru is trying to interfere, and… I understand that.”

“Oh, okay.” Takaki said after a moment of thought. It made sense, and he told Inoo so, who turned and gave him a small smile.

“Yeah?” He asked, and Takaki nodded, Inoo smiling again before slipping from the room and leaving him with his thoughts.

Yamada knew his roses didn’t need to be repotted, not really, but he was doing it anyway. He felt the leaves with his fingers, working slowly, breathing a little. He’d already pricked himself twice. The feeling of curiosity and concern preceded the door opening, and he looked up to see Hikaru walking in.

“I was told that I would find you here.” He said, sitting down on the floor next to him.

“Why were you looking for me?”

“You left in the middle of the meeting, and I was the one doing the yelling…” Hikaru began, and Yamada pursed his lips. Everyone was so worried about him, treating him like he was fragile, and he hated it. On the other hand though, he knew they were only doing it because they cared for him, and while that was nice, it also made him mad at himself. He couldn’t just grit his teeth and bear it to keep from concerning his teammates.

“It’s not your fault.” Yamada told Hikaru before he could continue. Hikaru raised his eyebrows.

“It’s not your fault either.” Hikaru said. Yamada turned his attention back to his garden.

“What’s even the point of this, me having this power?” He asked. He knew Hikaru probably wouldn’t have an answer for him--nobody else had--but he still couldn’t help the question. “Why give me something like this? What is it good for, being able to constantly read the emotions of everyone around me? Shouldn’t I at least be able to… To turn it off, or something?”

“Well, maybe with practice you’ll be able to.” Hikaru offered. Yamada swallowed.

“I’d better be. I’m no use to the team like this.”

“It’s not like your powers are useless.”

Yamada looked up at Hikaru, wanting him to elaborate. His powers had really never been more than a hinderance, and part of him really hated the affect they had on him.

“Yamada, you’re a powerful asset.” Hikaru told him, and there was a conviction in his voice that Yamada could feel was genuine, but he still didn’t believe it. “You can tell instantly when someone is lying, for one thing. That’s how you caught Inoo, isn’t it?” HIkaru waited until Yamada nodded. “And I’ve been told that you are getting better; you can transfer emotions to others now, right?”

Another nod, and this time Hikaru took a solemn pause.

“That’s good.” He said after a moment. “But it’s also very powerful, right? Making other people feel things. Torture would be rendered absolute, for one thing. You could make someone fear for their life for virtually no reason.”

“But I don’t want to do that.”

“Will you have a choice?”

“S.H.I.E.L.D. isn’t like that.”

“Still.” Hikaru sighed. “Which is why I want to go to S.H.I.E.L.D. and request consideration for a division with the well-being of Inhumans in mind, especially if they’re going to go around and collect them, like they have with Matsushima. He needs a safe place to work through what he’s doing, without the pressure of S.H.I.E.L.D. on his back. I don’t think it’s healthy.”

“So… Do you have full control of your powers?” Yamada asked. Hikaru paused for a moment.

“I don’t know.” He finally said. Yamada nodded a little. “I mean, I can control my clones well, but I don’t know the full extent of them. I haven’t tested things like how far they can go, or how long they can last. Stuff like that.”

“You were already Inhuman when the team first encountered you, weren’t you?” Yamada asked. He remembered Yabu and Daiki, both saying they were chasing someone that looked a lot like the hooded figure Yamada himself was in pursuit of. Hikaru nodded.

“I went on a bit of a quest once I’d left S.H.I.E.L.D., researching and examining alien artifacts.” He explained. “I came across a terrigen crystal in Germany. Once I’d broken out of my husk and the world had been turned upside down, I escaped to one of the safehouses I’d made for myself and stayed there for… For a while.”

Yamada had to admit, something like that sounded incredibly helpful. Hikaru got to his feet with a sigh.

“I’m heading into HQ with Yabu and Matsushima, to talk about my idea. And if it goes through, you’re more than welcome to any part of it you want.” He extended a hand down to help Yamada up, and he accepted it. “You don’t need to answer now, but just… Think about it, okay?”

Yamada nodded, wishing Hikaru luck as he left the room.

“Okay…” Chinen said quietly as he finished scanning, Daiki sitting as still as possible. He didn’t quite trust the portable x-ray Chinen had in his hand--wasn’t radiation supposed to be dangerous or something?--but the tiny agent was completely unbothered, so he guessed it couldn’t be too bad. Then again, Chinen was already a superhuman. Maybe he just wasn’t worried about it anymore.

“Do you want me to upload the scans?” Inoo asked, holding out a hand. Chinen nodded, handing the device over, and Daiki watched the interaction, his lips pursed. The lab was noticeably uncomfortable, but the mood was also being pointedly ignored. He wanted to say something, but Chinen spoke up first.

“How have you been feeling?” He asked. “Any headaches, dizziness, nausea, fatigue?”

“Nope.”

“Poor balance, temporary blackouts, ringing in your ears?”

“No, doctor.”

Chinen gave him a look at his tone, smiling a bit.

“I do have a of couple doctorate degrees.” He pointed out.

“So, the fracture is starting to heal already.” Inoo reported. He angled the screen in their direction, the x-ray of Daiki’s skull on it in black and white, the area of concern maximized. He’d been told after a diagnosis from their resident biochemist that he’d received a lateral skull fracture when being knocked out, but that really, he should consider himself lucky. He hadn’t seen at all how a fracture to his skull could be considered lucky, but began to understand after Chinen had listed the other head injury options that he’d managed to avoid.

Chinen stepped closer to the screen to get a better look.

“It is.” He remarked. “It’s healing really well, actually. That’s good.”

“Yeah?” Daiki squinted a bit, but in truth the x-rays didn’t mean much to him at all. He swung his legs over the side of the examination table. “Does that mean I’m free to go?”

“Almost.” Chinen held up a finger as though telling him to wait, turning away and walking to a far table with some sort of equipment on it. “There are a few coordination things I want to test, just in case. Stay there for a second.”

“Okay.” Daiki pulled his legs back up, and silence fell. Inoo was simply sitting in his seat in front of the computer, looking at his hands.

“How are you?” Daiki decided to ask him. Inoo looked up, his face hesitant.

“Good.” He answered. Daiki momentarily wished for Yamada’s powers, because ‘good’ was not how he would describe the uncharacteristically timid expression on Inoo’s face.

“Yeah?”

“Well, I mean…” Inoo glanced at Chinen, whose hands had stilled over the tools he was calibrating. “It’s not going to be the same.”

“We all want you back.” Daiki told him, and he watched Inoo swallow, his eyes going back to his hands. “We all heard what you did, and we all get it, but that doesn’t mean we don’t feel betrayed.”

“I know.” Inoo said quietly.

“And Inoo, I’ve known you a long time, and I would still trust you with my life, but… Even all that doesn’t change how this feels.”

Chinen had put the tools down on the table now, his body completely still. Inoo nodded a bit, not looking up.

“So, you know… It’ll take some time.” Daiki finished. “Talking would be good. And I want you to remember that I love you, okay?”

“Okay.” Inoo said. His voice quivered with his bottom lip. “Daiki, I’m sorry.”

“Thanks, but…” Daiki nodded a bit in Chinen’s direction. “I’m not really the one that needs to hear an apology right now.”

The little scientist brought his arms up, rubbing at his face before turning back to them, some gadgets Daiki couldn’t name in his hands. His face was dry, but his eyes and nose were red. He glanced at Inoo for just a moment, stopped in mid step when Inoo spoke up.

“Chinen, I’m so sorry.”

Chinen stood there for a moment, his face hidden largely with his bangs, before turning and giving his lab partner a small, watery smile, sniffing a little before speaking.

“I know you are.”

Keito offered up his hand, placing it palm up on his thigh, unable not to smile when Yuto took it and laced their fingers together.

“Hey.” He said and Yuto smiled back. Yuto had been sticking to him all day, touching him in some way since he’d returned from the retrieval mission. And it wasn’t just today, either; Yuto had been clingy since the Italy mission. Not that Keito minded--he loved physical contact, and Yuto was wonderful--but it had him a little concerned all the same. “Are you alright?”

“Sure.” Yuto said after a long moment, and Keito smiled back at him.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I just like you.” Yuto told him. “And it’s a little scary.”

“Scary?” Keito loosened his grip on Yuto’s hand. It was a reflex he’d picked up on, to release any tension when he felt emotions in a higher caliber than normal. “Scared of what? Me?”

“Of course not.” Yuto gave his hand a squeeze, and Keito went back to holding it. “Just… People don’t retire in this line of work, you know?”

“Yuto, I’m okay. I walked out of that op; I only got some bruises.” Keito told him.

“But you could have died. Or I could! You almost got shot, and there was nothing I could do, and it was horrible.”

Keito glanced up at him, and when Yuto’s head tilted down to look back, Keito gave him a quick kiss.

“Is this why you’ve been kissing me so much the past few days?” He couldn’t help but ask.

“Is it a bad thing?” Yuto asked back, looking worried. Keito resisted the urge to laugh, knowing the question had been serious.

“Of course not.”

“Then could… Could I just hold you for a little while?”

Keito leaned against him in response and Yuto got the hint, shifting to rest his back against the crook on the couch between the back and the arm, and Keito rested his head against Yuto’s chest, right under his chin. Yuto wrapped his arms around him, and Keito reveled in the feeling as Yuto kissed the top of his head. The feeling, amidst so much confusion, that everything was right.

“They’re coming back.” Chinen reported, walking quickly into the conference room, Inoo trying his best to keep up. “Yabu just texted me. They’re coming back.”

Inoo counted quickly, wondering who still needed to be told, realizing that no, everyone had congregated in the conference room, something that often happened when they were on the plane with nothing to do.

“They? As in both of them?” Yuto asked. Chinen nodded.

“The text says ‘we’.” He said.

“Does that mean… The plan worked?”

“No idea.” Inoo took a seat next to Yamada. Chinen moved to sit next to him, his butt only touching the seat for a second before he was up again, pacing.

“I don’t think it did.” Takaki said. He was standing, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. “I mean… I’m surprised that Hikaru is coming back at all. S.H.I.E.L.D. was sending some big name people after him, last I heard. I wonder if Yabu’s in trouble.”

“Maybe the second person in ‘we’ is Matsushima?” Yamada offered, getting a few nods. “We already have a few Inhumans on the team, so it would make sense for him to be put in a unit with us. Maybe all three of them are coming back.”

“But Matsushima and Hikaru aren’t agents.” Daiki pointed out. “They can’t be assigned to a team like that.”

“If it did succeed, does that mean the Inhumans have to leave?” Keito spoke up. Nobody answered; nobody had any answers for any of the questions, simply throwing theories out into the air as they waited.

“Probably not.” Inoo finally heard himself saying. He had no idea. Everyone’s head turned as they heard Chinen’s phone go off.

“They’re here.” He read, and minutes later Yabu strode in, Chinen stopping his pacing, and Hikaru walked in after him.

“Well?” Inoo prompted, unable to help himself. Matsushima wasn’t with them, and he couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or something bad. Instead of answering, Yabu looked to Hikaru, who gave the smallest of smiles. It wasn’t much, but it was enough.

“They approved it.” He announced, and it was as though the entire room breathed a sigh of relief. “It will take a while, a long while, but it’ll happen. I’ll have to be reinstated as an agent, and report all of my information directly back to HQ, but… Any and all Inhumans found in the country are being sent to the program first, and I can help them. Nobody goes anywhere until they’re ready, and they don’t even have to be a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent if they don’t want to.”

His excitement was barely below the surface, and for the slightest of moments glanced over at Inoo, and Inoo couldn’t help but smile. This had been it. This was what they’d been trying for since Hikaru had first gotten in touch with him, and it was finally in Hikaru’s grasp. It had been a confusing, roundabout, unorthodox journey, but Inoo began to feel that just maybe, it was worth it.

The process was long. Hikaru knew it would be, but that knowledge didn’t make it move faster, and his desire to get started immediately made all of the protocols and paperwork crawl by. It was strange, after so many years, to be back in the setting of so many vivid childhood memories, especially with Yabu next to him, walking through the halls like they did years ago. Hikaru found that more than good or bad it was strangely therapeutic, seeing how everything had changed and yet remained so the same.

The first thing that happened after getting him back to speed and instated with a badge from S.H.I.E.L.D. was to argue through a plan of operations. He really hated a few of the protocols that he wasn’t able to debate from the table, like index registration and psychotherapy sessions, but he kept his feelings to himself upon meeting the therapist he would have to work with, a rather unassuming man named Inagaki Goro. Setting up his base was the fun part, able to buy a stretch of woodland that faded into a beach. He figured that the less infrastructure the better, though he was still instructed to plant a few power containment pods throughout the base, for some safety measure.

Any moment the team wasn’t in the air for a mission, Yabu was by his side. To Hikaru’s surprise, so was Yamada. It was helpful, getting input from both an Inhuman and a S.H.I.E.L.D. official, and he took it all to heart, from the praises to the criticisms.

The day finally arrived. It felt surreal, having gotten this far, his badge sporting the words ‘Director of the Inhuman Directive Division’ feeling heavy on the lanyard around his neck. He looked over the training yard, a few young, prospective agents scurrying around as they set up the finishing touches.

“Well?” He asked, turning to Yamada, who was standing next to him. “Do you think we can do this?”

Yamada glanced back at him. Yamada had requested to be transferred, and while Hikaru was grateful to have someone to take all of this on with, he knew how the agent must be feeling; when Hikaru had left his own team, he’d felt lost and out of place for a long time. But unlike himself, Yamada hadn’t left his group to strike out on his own. He was here, with a purpose, and Hikaru got a confident nod in response.

“Yeah.” He said. “I think we can.”

“Good. Let’s go.” 


End file.
